TG Chat Thread 2017

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Traditional Games > TG Chat Thread 2017

Haystack: Jan 23, 2005

Reene posted:

you cannot call them peripherally involved in the hobby when they have their names on the most iconic product in the entire hobby and have made a living doing poo poo related to the hobby.

And I didn't. I said that (lots of) D&D 5 consumers are peripheral, not Zak. I'm all too keenly aware of how established he is.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 05:39

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# ? May 14, 2024 23:08

Reene: Aug 26, 2005

I misread what you meant my bad

and nobody expects people to just absorb that they're poo poo through osmosis but that's why people talk about it and bring it up when 5E gets brought up.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 05:49

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

Put this racist on ignore immediately!

Haystack posted:

And I didn't. I said that (lots of) D&D 5 consumers are peripheral, not Zak. I'm all too keenly aware of how established he is.

It's totally inaccurate to ever describe 5e as having "lots of" consumers when there are actually only six and five live in Alaska.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 06:04

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

I'm planning to introduce some people into the hobby, but I'm not going to do it through D&D 5e, and if they ask, I'm going to be upfront with them and tell them that it's because I vehemently am against endorsing 5e as a product because of its ties with people who are, simply put, not good.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 08:08

Countblanc: Apr 20, 2005; _{Help a hero out!}

Also tell them it's a bad game.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 08:34

gradenko_2000: Oct 5, 2010; HELL SERPENT; Lipstick Apathy

Countblanc posted:

Also tell them it's a bad game.

I mean yeah I agree, my implied point was that people who don't really have a point of reference to what I'm talking about when I say "caster vs martial disparity" or "too much ask your DM" might not care, but they should be able to understand what I'm saying when I say an anti-LGBT serial harasser and a right-wing nutjob are credited as consultants.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 08:40

drrockso20: May 6, 2013; Has Not Actually Done Cocaine

So anyone here own a copy of Mythic Russia(specifically the one that uses Hero Quest), cause I was contemplating maybe buying a copy next month since it's not all that expensive on Lulu even in Hardcover format

# ? Mar 22, 2017 11:20

FastestGunAlive: Apr 7, 2010; Dancing palm tree.

Spellbound Kingdoms is cool and I want to see someone else do a similar take on the combat maneuvers chart some day

# ? Mar 22, 2017 11:46

Flavivirus: Dec 14, 2011; The next stage of evolution.

So the current humble bundle is streaming-focused and contains an app called FaceRig which seems like it might be pretty awesome for online games even if it skews a little anime:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cbIWRd514-s

Anyone tried it?

# ? Mar 22, 2017 12:38

Kwyndig: Sep 23, 2006; Heeeeeey

Did somebody say anime facerig?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bd5_vOKwe_Y

# ? Mar 22, 2017 12:59

Mr.Misfit: Jan 10, 2013; The time for
SkellyBones
has come!

Kwyndig posted:

Did somebody say anime facerig?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bd5_vOKwe_Y

Get the flame thrower. It finally happened. The anime has....come!

But seriously...that�s both ridiculous and absurd.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 14:54

Reene: Aug 26, 2005

drrockso20 posted:

So anyone here own a copy of Mythic Russia(specifically the one that uses Hero Quest), cause I was contemplating maybe buying a copy next month since it's not all that expensive on Lulu even in Hardcover format

Weirdly, yes.

It's a very pretty book. I haven't dug into the mechanics very much or actually run a game with it so I can't say much about how it actually plays but in terms of physically owning the book it was a very nice gift.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 15:42

Plutonis: Mar 25, 2011

Countblanc posted:

Also tell them it's a bad game.

I recently joined the altright movement and named the three newborn piglets born from my aryan bred sow on the european white south Brazilian white nationalist white separatist commune I live Donald Trump, Milo Yabblapolvis and Julius Evola but I shan't be running DnD 5E on our Aryan Game night due to how clunky and buggy the system is and will rather play Varg Vikernes' Myfarog instead.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:23

Cease to Hope: Dec 12, 2011

Plutonis posted:

I recently joined the altright movement and named the three newborn piglets born from my aryan bred sow on the european white south Brazilian white nationalist white separatist commune I live Donald Trump, Milo Yabblapolvis and Julius Evola but I shan't be running DnD 5E on our Aryan Game night due to how clunky and buggy the system is and will rather play Varg Vikernes' Myfarog instead.

are you having a stroke

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:31

Rockopolis: Dec 21, 2012; I MAKE FUN OF QUEER STORYGAMES BECAUSE I HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO WITH MY LIFE THAN MAKE OTHER PEOPLE CRY

I can't understand these kinds of games, and not getting it bugs me almost as much as me being weird

Why is it always loony alt-right types that come out with these lovely games? Why isn't there like, a Bolshevik heartbreaker, or a Motorcycle Diaries RPG?

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:45

Ominous Jazz: Jun 15, 2011; Big D is chillin' over here
Wasteland style

Plutonis posted:

I recently joined the altright movement and named the three newborn piglets born from my aryan bred sow on the european white south Brazilian white nationalist white separatist commune I live Donald Trump, Milo Yabblapolvis and Julius Evola but I shan't be running DnD 5E on our Aryan Game night due to how clunky and buggy the system is and will rather play Varg Vikernes' Myfarog instead.

I mean yeah sure, you could make a post like this if you wanted to.
edit:

Fuego Fish posted:

I get the feeling that if you told people "oh yeah, the D&D 5e PHB gives special thanks to a white supremacist" there would be a lot more loud discourse along the lines of "what the gently caress" and maybe even some actual blowback in WotC's direction.

I think you underestimate how terrible nerd culture is and people's commitment to pretending like games and art just plop out of thin air.
^nerd culture attracts these people because critical analysis is a hosed thing in america

Ominous Jazz fucked around with this message at 18:49 on Mar 22, 2017

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:45

Kwyndig: Sep 23, 2006; Heeeeeey

Rockopolis posted:

Why is it always loony alt-right types that come out with these lovely games? Why isn't there like, a Bolshevik heartbreaker, or a Motorcycle Diaries RPG?

How would a Bolshevik heartbreaker even work? Do dragons control the means of production?

poo poo, that's actually a decent writing prompt.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:49

Evil Mastermind: Apr 28, 2008

Kwyndig posted:

How would a Bolshevik heartbreaker even work? Do dragons control the means of production?

poo poo, that's actually a decent writing prompt.

https://twitter.com/existentialnick/status/842842012722388994

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:50

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Kwyndig posted:

How would a Bolshevik heartbreaker even work? Do dragons control the means of production?

All Stalinist propaganda is just the same bland drivel repeated over and over and over, so it'll fit right in with the OSR.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:54

Antivehicular: Dec 30, 2011; I wanna sing one for the cars
That are right now headed silent down the highway
And it's dark and there is nobody driving And something has got to give

Halloween Jack posted:

All Stalinist propaganda is just the same bland drivel repeated over and over and over, so it'll fit right in with the OSR.

At least the art'll be better.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:59

Kwyndig: Sep 23, 2006; Heeeeeey

Soviet propaganda art was pretty sweet, yeah.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 18:59

unseenlibrarian: Jun 4, 2012; There's only one thing in the mountains that leaves a track like this. The creature of legend that roams the Timberline. My people named him Sasquatch. You call him... Bigfoot.

(Insert joke about Red Dragons here)

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:02

bbcisdabomb: Jan 15, 2008; SHEESH

davmillar posted:

Speaking of awkward segues...

My app, Dave's Mapper, now runs on https and has like a 400x speed and bandwidth improvement. If you need some randomly generated dungeon or cavern or city or spaceship maps or just feel like loving around with a web app for a few minutes, please check it out. And then whine to me and tell me what you hate about it so I can improve it. Or something.

Also, I still haven't managed to play an RPG yet, but I did see the movie Mazes and Monsters. Does that count for anything?

It got buried a few pages ago but thanks for this, it's really nice looking. I may be running 4e again soonish and I'll be needing maps soon.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:10

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

Put this racist on ignore immediately!

Kwyndig posted:

How would a Bolshevik heartbreaker even work? Do dragons control the means of production?

poo poo, that's actually a decent writing prompt.

Reminds me of this passage from Trollman's 3e house rules.

quote:

Bringing the World out of the Dark Ages

It is historical fact that you can take a ridiculous and crumbling imperium with serfs and horse-drawn carts managed by a tyrannical and squabbling aristocracy and boot strap it into being a technologically sophisticated global power that can win the space race and such in a single generation even while being invaded by an evil and genocidal empire. The people at the top don't even need to be nice or sane, they just have to understand that economics is an entirely voodoo science, and the limits of production can be broken by thousands of percentage points by getting everyone to buy on credit, work on projects that people looking at the big picture tell them to work on, continuously invest in productive capital, and believe in the future.

Right. That's called Communism, and it ends the dark ages immediately even if it isn't run well. Presumably if it was being run by Paladins who actually radiate goodness and Wizards who are inhumanly intelligent and can cast powerful divinations to determine projected needs and goods could be distributed to the masses with teleportals � it would work substantially better. That sort of thing is not outside the capabilities of your characters in D&D. It's not outside the capabilities of the people in the village your characters are saving from gnollish invasion. It's not even technically complicated. But it isn't done.

Partly it isn't done because we're playing Dungeons & Dragons, not Logistics & Dragons. While it is true that you can fix the world's ills in a much more tangible fashion by industrializing the production of grain and arranging a non-gold based distribution system such that staple food stuffs are available to all, thereby freeing up potential productive labor for use in blah blah blah� the fact is that to a very real degree we play this game because telling stories about slaying evil necromancers and swinging on chandeliers is awesome. But the other reason is that the society in D&D really isn't ready for a modern or futuristic social setup. Noone is going to understand how they are supposed to interact with Socialism, Capitalism, or Fascism, things are Feudal and people understand that. Wealth is exchanged for goods and services on the grounds that people on both sides of the exchange aren't sure that they would win the resulting combat if they tried to take the goods or wealth by force of arms.

Rome had steam engines. Actual difference engines that propelled a metal device with the power of a combustion reaction through the medium of the expansion of heated water. Really. They never built rail roads because slaves were cheaper than donkeys and the concept of investing in labor saving devices was preposterous. In D&D, the idea of having an economy based around trust in the government and labor/wealth equivalencies is similarly preposterous. It's not that the idea wouldn't work, it's that every man, woman, and child in society would simply laugh you out of the room if you tried to explain it to them.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:15

Plutonis: Mar 25, 2011

Rockopolis posted:

Why is it always loony alt-right types that come out with these lovely games? Why isn't there like, a Bolshevik heartbreaker, or a Motorcycle Diaries RPG?

Socialists have better things to do and better ways to spread their ideas than something stupid like a Communist *World hack.

Like distributing trot newspapers!

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:28

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Kwyndig posted:

Soviet propaganda art was pretty sweet, yeah.

Oh hell yeah, but try actually reading an essay on juche some time...

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:30

Lemon-Lime: Aug 6, 2009

Cease to Hope posted:

are you having a stroke

Welcome to the TG chat thread, new poster who's never seen Plutonis before.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:48

Evil Mastermind: Apr 28, 2008

Gobbeldygook posted:

Reminds me of this passage from Trollman's 3e house rules.

Ceterum censeo Trollman esse delendam.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:53

Kwyndig: Sep 23, 2006; Heeeeeey

Trollman's a goddamn idiot. Your average feudal peasant's life wouldn't change at all under Communism unless magic or technology was used to increase crop yields in a way that improved their labor burden. Without that all that changes is the title of the guy who they hand the grain over to and maybe how much of it they get to keep for themselves. Farming before mechanization doesn't change with politics unless somebody does something really stupid, so farmers don't care about politics.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 19:56

Rockopolis: Dec 21, 2012; I MAKE FUN OF QUEER STORYGAMES BECAUSE I HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO WITH MY LIFE THAN MAKE OTHER PEOPLE CRY

I can't understand these kinds of games, and not getting it bugs me almost as much as me being weird

Gobbeldygook posted:

Reminds me of this passage from Trollman's 3e house rules.

Problem is, that sounds kind of like an amazing game to play. Like a Lest Darkness Fall campaign, or a what-if on any of the dozens of peasants revolts that got brutally suppressed.

Edit
He says we're not doing it,but doesn't say why. It's like he's says they're not doing it because it isn't done, begging the question?

Rockopolis fucked around with this message at 20:09 on Mar 22, 2017

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:06

Evil Mastermind: Apr 28, 2008

Well, Frank was also the guy who thought that picking up a bow in 4e was houseruling, and that being able to drive a car or fire a gun was a "huge problem" in terms of game balance, and that a character not changing their weapon after a while wasn't "telling a story".

It's amazing that even after all these years I remember this poo poo, and it still pisses me off.

Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:06

Halloween Jack: Sep 12, 2003; I WILL CUT OFF BOTH OF MY ARMS BEFORE I VOTE FOR ANYONE THAT IS MORE POPULAR THAN BERNIE!!!!!

Kwyndig posted:

Trollman's a goddamn idiot. Your average feudal peasant's life wouldn't change at all under Communism unless magic or technology was used to increase crop yields in a way that improved their labor burden. Without that all that changes is the title of the guy who they hand the grain over to and maybe how much of it they get to keep for themselves. Farming before mechanization doesn't change with politics unless somebody does something really stupid, so farmers don't care about politics.

Well I mean in an actual functioning little-c communist state you wouldn't have warfare or a war economy consuming and destroying agricultural surplus. You wouldn't have a huge luxury goods economy doing that, either.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:12

Kwyndig: Sep 23, 2006; Heeeeeey

Halloween Jack posted:

Well I mean in an actual functioning little-c communist state you wouldn't have warfare or a war economy consuming and destroying agricultural surplus. You wouldn't have a huge luxury goods economy doing that, either.

You'd still have warfare if we're assuming a high fantasy setting. Just because your state has it all figured out doesn't mean Johnny Feudal next door or the orc warband down the lane isn't going to kick your poo poo in, it just means you only fight defensive wars.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:35

Plutonis: Mar 25, 2011

Kwyndig posted:

You'd still have warfare if we're assuming a high fantasy setting. Just because your state has it all figured out doesn't mean Johnny Feudal next door or the orc warband down the lane isn't going to kick your poo poo in, it just means you only fight defensive wars.

A peasant ruled state would be a pariah that every state near it would try to destroy like Dithmarschen lol (which even then was a peasant oligarchy)

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:47

Rockopolis: Dec 21, 2012; I MAKE FUN OF QUEER STORYGAMES BECAUSE I HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO WITH MY LIFE THAN MAKE OTHER PEOPLE CRY

I can't understand these kinds of games, and not getting it bugs me almost as much as me being weird

Kwyndig posted:

You'd still have warfare if we're assuming a high fantasy setting. Just because your state has it all figured out doesn't mean Johnny Feudal next door or the orc warband down the lane isn't going to kick your poo poo in, it just means you only fight defensive wars.

And unless you're some kind of revisionist, exporting revolution.

Edit
Beaten like a bourgeois.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:49

Cease to Hope: Dec 12, 2011

Kwyndig posted:

Trollman's a goddamn idiot. Your average feudal peasant's life wouldn't change at all under Communism unless magic or technology was used to increase crop yields in a way that improved their labor burden.

bureaucratically-administered central economic planning is a technology that would increase both crop yields and labor efficiency in a way that would improve on their labor burden. there's also the (not quoted) fact that magic that would increase their efficiency does exist and presumably isn't being used to do so - his argument is why it hasn't already done so and why players probably can't make it happen unless it's the entire focus of the campaign.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:49

Reene: Aug 26, 2005

Didn't we JUST have a conversation about using zombie labor to effectively automate agriculture-related labor I swear we did

# ? Mar 22, 2017 20:52

Cease to Hope: Dec 12, 2011

melfist-leomundist revels promising a Great Teleport Forward would be a pretty rad campaign premise

let a hundred black lotuses bloom

# ? Mar 22, 2017 21:02

gnome7: Oct 21, 2010; Who's this Little
Spaghetti?? ??

Reene posted:

Didn't we JUST have a conversation about using zombie labor to effectively automate agriculture-related labor I swear we did

It's come up at least twice in the Murphy's thread.

# ? Mar 22, 2017 21:02

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# ? May 14, 2024 23:08

Cease to Hope: Dec 12, 2011

i'm more of a metronist-fourth-worldist myself tbh

# ? Mar 22, 2017 21:04

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