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Subjunctive posted:Ah, ok. About how many new choices do you expect non-casters to get? Seems like that would depend a lot on what levels look like after 10, right? We currently have very little/no insight into that. But as far as the level 1-10 experience goes I'm not really sure that it's worth getting up in arms about the fact that that the big book o' spells for people what want more spells does give more options to characters with Power scores (which is 2.5-3 of the 4 base paths at Novice, and then potentially all 4 at Expert/Master). Especially given how SotDL uses traditions to replicate "class features," the limitations on the breadth of spells a character can realistically access, the effects level 1-5 spells actually provide, etc.
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Apr 10, 2018 00:14
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Subjunctive posted:Ah, ok. About how many new choices do you expect non-casters to get? How many spells do you think a given caster gets? Its not like they're handed all 800, jesus.
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Apr 10, 2018 21:07
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RagnarokAngel posted:How many spells do you think a given caster gets? Its not like they're handed all 800, jesus. No, of course not. In aggregate, I meant, just as the 800 number was used. Let me try this way: is SotDL a fantasy game in which spellcasters have many more interesting choices to make than non-spellcasters do, in and out of combat? Is it becoming more or less so over time? Subjunctive fucked around with this message at 21:38 on Apr 10, 2018 |
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Apr 10, 2018 21:35
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fighters having less to do than mages is usually a symptom of bad dming or lack of imagination on the fighters part. your battlefield should be filled with poo poo like hanging chandeliers or rivers of lava or piss. one of my PCs who is a fighter just died by bullrushing a thousand year old vampire, grabbing hold of her and jumping out a window at the top of her castle. if all of your combats take place in featureless rooms then being a fighter will suck but so will everything else.
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Apr 12, 2018 00:11
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in other words the main draw of sotdl is how rules light it is. in pathfinder or whatever fighters have more "options" and in practice it ends up being a nightmare cluster gently caress like I imagine these 800 spells are going to end up being. the lack of specific rules places a burden on the player and on the DM to come up with cool poo poo and act accordingly
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Apr 12, 2018 00:21
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Gay Horney posted:in other words the main draw of sotdl is how rules light it is. in pathfinder or whatever fighters have more "options" and in practice it ends up being a nightmare cluster gently caress like I imagine these 800 spells are going to end up being. the lack of specific rules places a burden on the player and on the DM to come up with cool poo poo and act accordingly Yeah, the minimalism is appealing because it naturally leaves more narrative room for players of all classes. SotDL evolves quickly (does Rob sleep?) and I was concerned that the 800 spells pointed down a direction where the mechanics defined player agency in many more cases, without providing those definitions for non-casting classes. I think we all know from painful experience that when a system makes a power to cover a situation the strong tendency is to play as though that power is required to cover that situation. With more situations covered only for casters, non-casters lose agency by default.
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Apr 12, 2018 00:31
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I think looking at the number is misleading because you have to consider how many spell schools there are with all the supplements, then factor in that theyre adding at least 5 to each (one for each power level from 6 to 10). Not giving spells for this range would be like denying fighter classes abilities on level up. Casters are only going to have access to a fraction of schools, and of those, not all of them will be great or interesting. Many will likely "just" deal damage. Just seeing 800 new spells is highly misleading on paper.
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Apr 12, 2018 00:49
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Sure, I get that. I just wanted to know if non-casters were growing in definition proportionately to casters. Fine to slice that by school and martial class.
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Apr 12, 2018 00:50
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Subjunctive posted:Yeah, the minimalism is appealing because it naturally leaves more narrative room for players of all classes. SotDL evolves quickly (does Rob sleep?) and I was concerned that the 800 spells pointed down a direction where the mechanics defined player agency in many more cases, without providing those definitions for non-casting classes. I think we all know from painful experience that when a system makes a power to cover a situation the strong tendency is to play as though that power is required to cover that situation. With more situations covered only for casters, non-casters lose agency by default. The actual spells don't seem to indicate this will be a significant problem though- using the most recent OP test (now that I'm signed up as a tester), when the spells are narrative rather than combat powers they tend to be level 0 cantrippy things that do stuff like "re-enact Face/Off for an hour using a handy corpse" (which provides no automatic successes or even concrete bonuses, you'd still need to dress and act appropriately to impersonate someone) or "magically conceal a carried object for an hour" - those are useful things, but like... they're also fairly narrow things whose ultimate goal (impersonating someone or smuggling an object) you could reasonably accomplish with an appropriate background and/or a challenge roll, and given how learning spells in SotDL works the opportunity cost for these effects is very real, even for Wizards with the time and money to amass a prodigious Grimore collection (and much more so for anyone else). I won't say that your concerns are totally misplaced, but as far as I can tell this is really an effort to solidify the options for players with Power scores by giving them a fuller range of evocative effects for each Tradition- i.e. if I'm a priest with Primal powers I've got more options that let me define that tradition as either purely summoner/support or beast-within-based-melee (or both and largely/entirely eschew other Traditions). To me at least the spells in the 0-5 (and really 0-6) range generally feel like they'd be right at home in the core book (with some leeway for being a playtest document). e: Subjunctive posted:Sure, I get that. I just wanted to know if non-casters were growing in definition proportionately to casters. Fine to slice that by school and martial class. No, but I don't think they really need to- it's 1 (or 1.5) paths out of 4, and those paths always had vastly fewer theoretical options/combinations than Power based characters. That doesn't stop the core SotDL Warrior (and non-magical Rogue) from being very good options in practice, and it's not like they've been neglected as time has gone on- the somewhat lackluster marital Expert paths in the core were revisited (admittedly Barbarian is still "ehhh" but the revised Fighter is so good it doesn't really matter), and the last mechanically focused supplement released was a collection of Warrior-specific options. LGD fucked around with this message at 01:46 on Apr 12, 2018 |
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Apr 12, 2018 01:10
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If you ask me, the reasoning behind this book is simple: Rob needs to eat and he knows that nerds love huge lists of poo poo they'll never actually use. That's not to say I won't pick it up nor that I think it won't be a cool product. But to me it seems like its catering towards a certain set who have the cash to drop on a book of 800 spells and are a pretty reliable audience.
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Apr 12, 2018 01:14
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Yeah, I’m not questioning the motivation, but rather the effects on the game. It sounds from upthread that things are in a good place.
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Apr 12, 2018 01:27
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Serf posted:If you ask me, the reasoning behind this book is simple: Rob needs to eat and he knows that nerds love huge lists of poo poo they'll never actually use. That's not to say I won't pick it up nor that I think it won't be a cool product. But to me it seems like its catering towards a certain set who have the cash to drop on a book of 800 spells and are a pretty reliable audience. i feel extremely called out
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Apr 12, 2018 01:30
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I actually hope we get some Bo9S style martial manoeuvres for non-casters at some point.
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Apr 12, 2018 08:22
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Gay Horney posted:fighters having less to do than mages is usually a symptom of bad dming or lack of imagination on the fighters part. your battlefield should be filled with poo poo like hanging chandeliers or rivers of lava or piss. one of my PCs who is a fighter just died by bullrushing a thousand year old vampire, grabbing hold of her and jumping out a window at the top of her castle. if all of your combats take place in featureless rooms then being a fighter will suck but so will everything else. Yeah, this. My group just instigated a revolt by smuggling an invading orc legion through the undercity through the Circle of Blood and Iron where they work. Having decided on this as a flashpoint, we drew up plans for the colosseum together, and then tasks for all players could be mapped out: The warrior/monk would distract the Bronze legion guards, the rogue/assassin sneak down a parapet to cut the gate ropes to trap in the slaveowners there to see the big show, while the gladiator would convince his opponent to help him gently caress up the bosses, and the mage provide support from the battlements. As my last post shows it went to hell pretty quickly, but they each had (one!) job. Of course, having your players pick and help you develop an interesting and trait-filled battleground is my wet dream as a GM, but in any case you can plot out likely battlefields ahead of time. If your players don't bite, ambush them at your favorite hazardous terrain!
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Apr 12, 2018 08:52
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General question about challenge rolls. The game I've played the most is Pathfinder, the land of a dozen roll modifiers and scaling DCs. I've played 5e to a lesser degree, which has vaguer DCs and more tightly bounded skill checks, but they're still present. The idea of fixed DC checks is something I'm having trouble wrapping my head around, in terms of game balance. Take a check that involves walking across a narrow beam. Just spitballing some low-to-mid level characters, good and bad at dextrous things: Pathfinder rogue with +13 acrobatics and a cleric with +1, 5e rogue with +10 acrobatics and a cleric with +1, SotDL rogue with +4 agi and a magician with -1. Pathfinder: 2' wide beam at DC 5, 4" wide beam at DC 15, icy 1" wide beam at DC 25 The rogue has no issue with the first two, and has a decent shot at the icy beam (100%, 95%, 45%). The cleric has to be careful on the widest beam, struggles with the middle beam, and chooses to walk around the icy beam (85%, 35%, 0%). 5e: 2' wide beam at DC 5, 4" wide beam at DC 15, 1" wide beam at DC 25 The rogue has little issue with the first two, and struggles with the icy beam (100%, 80%, 30%). The cleric is the same as PF (85%, 35%, 0%). SotDL: 2' wide beam at 3 boons (average +5), 4" wide beam at 0 boons, 1" wide beam at 3 banes (average -5) The rogue breezes through the first one and doesn't struggle much with the latter two (100%, 75%, 50%). The magician does fine on the first two, and might manage the last one (85%, 60%, 35%). So at the low end, it'll be pretty consistent, but only if you work with averages. A fairly dextrous SotDL rogue might fall off a 2' wide beam if he rolls a 4 and gets 1s on his boons, while a PF rogue basically can't fall off anything wider than 2". The effect of boons/banes skews the ranges, with the target always being 10. Similarly, at the high end, how do you draw the line? You can pile on as many banes as you want, but eventually it caps at -6: you effectively cannot have a DC higher than 16. After a certain threshold of boons/banes it's a check where you wouldn't even ask them to roll (walking across straight ground, walking across a cloud). To a degree, this post was just me doing some math to see how skill checks/challenges compare between the games in terms of feasibility for easy/hard task, but I'm also looking for input on how people tend to adjudicate skill challenges in terms of deciding how many boons/banes to grant.
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Apr 13, 2018 21:21
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Pathfinder DCs are also not equivalent to 5e ones because of the bounded accuracy thing - DC 25s basically don't exist RAW.
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Apr 13, 2018 21:27
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Jeffrey of YOSPOS posted:Pathfinder DCs are also not equivalent to 5e ones because of the bounded accuracy thing - DC 25s basically don't exist RAW. Elysiume fucked around with this message at 21:33 on Apr 13, 2018 |
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Apr 13, 2018 21:31
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Elysiume posted:25 is very hard, the DMG has checks going up to 30 (nearly impossible). I think your numbers might be otherwise off. A 5e rogue that has +10 either used their expertise on that (available to very few classes, certainly not typical even for the highly-skilled.), or is at least level 13. If I'm remembering pathfinder right(and I'm probably not), you'd get +13 from stats + skill points by level 6 or so. I think sotdl is a little more grounded in general, and perhaps the DM ought to feel okay saying "no you can't walk across that" more readily than in pathfinder. I don't think there's much point to rolling a DC5 skill check in general in any of those games though - if it's that easy, it's an autopass barring any complication. If failure in such a case is so interesting that you really feel the need to make it possible by rolling a 1, make it more likely than that and add a complication. It's worth happening at all it's worth happening with not-insignificant probability. I kinda just don't think it matters - if both outcomes are interesting, and skilled characters are more likely to do well than unskilled characters, I don't really see the issue with whatever the probabilities are. It's not like I'm doing the pathfinder skill math and thoughtfully picking a DC based on a probability analysis anyway, I just go with my gut. If that means experts sometimes fail at simple things, fine. If that means beginners still fairly often succeed, fine. If both outcomes are not interesting, don't roll a skill check. Jeffrey of YOSPOS fucked around with this message at 21:53 on Apr 13, 2018 |
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Apr 13, 2018 21:43
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Jeffrey of YOSPOS posted:Lol that's a little silly but fair enough - I haven't read the 5e DMG like at all, I think 20 is the highest in the PHB and monster spellcasters might go a few points above that. Makes sense, might as well just give it a go and see how things shake out.
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Apr 13, 2018 21:54
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Failing at an easy tasks while skilled feels a lot worse for a player than failing at hard tasks(skilled or otherwise), or succeeding at either easy or hard tasks. I'd be much more wary of the rogue falling off the wide beam than any of the other outcomes.
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Apr 13, 2018 22:10
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Elysiume posted:General question about challenge rolls. The game I've played the most is Pathfinder, the land of a dozen roll modifiers and scaling DCs. I've played 5e to a lesser degree, which has vaguer DCs and more tightly bounded skill checks, but they're still present. The idea of fixed DC checks is something I'm having trouble wrapping my head around, in terms of game balance. Take a check that involves walking across a narrow beam. Just spitballing some low-to-mid level characters, good and bad at dextrous things: Pathfinder rogue with +13 acrobatics and a cleric with +1, 5e rogue with +10 acrobatics and a cleric with +1, SotDL rogue with +4 agi and a magician with -1. dont do this
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Apr 14, 2018 03:51
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Gay Horney posted:dont do this
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Apr 14, 2018 04:06
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you're trying to solve a problem that doesn't really exist is what I'm saying but it looks like you figured that out
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Apr 14, 2018 04:17
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Yeah, Jeffrey got me sorted. I was definitely overthinking it. Pathfinder has taught me that numbers are the alpha and the omega.
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Apr 14, 2018 04:53
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The only problem with the whole "only roll if it REALLY matters" thing is that, in my experience, players really love to roll, and this might be on me, but there aren't THAT many situations where a success and a failure are both interesting.
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Apr 14, 2018 10:51
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Just wanted to clarify the attack option listings. e.g. the Cultist in the core book has 'Sickle (melee) +1 (1d6)' - this means the attack roll is [1d20 and add 1], and if it hits roll 1d6 damage. Is that correct?
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Apr 15, 2018 13:59
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Hollandia posted:Just wanted to clarify the attack option listings. Yep.
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Apr 15, 2018 14:23
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Infinity Gaia posted:The only problem with the whole "only roll if it REALLY matters" thing is that, in my experience, players really love to roll, and this might be on me, but there aren't THAT many situations where a success and a failure are both interesting. That's what failing forwards is for. Don't have failure be "you gently caress up try again", have it be "you succeeded but at some cost" e.g. on a climbing check you make it but ruin your rope, on a stealth check you make it but you leave strong hints of your identity if they're still there in a few hours time, on a performance check to make a quick buck you get that quick buck but you offend someone powerful, and so on.
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Apr 15, 2018 23:45
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Or tell them flat out "okay you're going to suceed at this the roll is to see how well you do/avoid other complications"
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Apr 15, 2018 23:51
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Anyone ever try running a basic d&d module in this? I think it will work fine, just curious how it's been for others. I want to run deep carbon observatory(I'm in love) and SotDL seems to fit the mood perfectly while having all manner of modern niceties. I don't think levelling up once per session will work for it but I'll see. Jeffrey of YOSPOS fucked around with this message at 22:03 on Apr 16, 2018 |
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Apr 16, 2018 21:38
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Woo! Another Rob's Basement podcast dropped.  Looks like everyone was sick for a week or something. Helical Nightmares fucked around with this message at 04:38 on Apr 17, 2018 |
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Apr 17, 2018 04:33
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How married is this game to squicky body horror? I want to play Adventuresome, Heroic Fantasy and I'm intrigued by this mechanical interpretation. Also, is it worth it to get physical copies of any books? It seems like there was a lot of chat early in teh thread about the various books getting errata'd.
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Apr 17, 2018 19:49
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Impermanent posted:How married is this game to squicky body horror? I want to play Adventuresome, Heroic Fantasy and I'm intrigued by this mechanical interpretation. Also, is it worth it to get physical copies of any books? It seems like there was a lot of chat early in teh thread about the various books getting errata'd. I think it can be easily divorced from all that. The Insanity and Corruption mechanics are can be ignored, and other than that not many paths have interactions with them. Get rid of the Forbidden magic tradition and disregard a lot of the monster fluff and you're in good shape. I'm working on a normie hack for the game, and when I get it into playable shape I'll drop it in this thread.
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Apr 17, 2018 19:54
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Impermanent posted:How married is this game to squicky body horror? I want to play Adventuresome, Heroic Fantasy and I'm intrigued by this mechanical interpretation. Also, is it worth it to get physical copies of any books? It seems like there was a lot of chat early in teh thread about the various books getting errata'd. Moderate rolls: Witnessing a loved one’s violent death; being tortured; returning from the dead; seeing a person eaten alive by ghouls; discovering a weird mutation on one’s body. Also if your player are murder hobos they will loving get enough corruption points to start having stuff like rolling for the following: _A weeping red eye appears in the palm of each of your hands. _Your reproductive organs shrivel and fall off or out of your body. _You grow a second row of teeth in your mouth and a new row of teeth in an unexpected place. So yeah if you want it CAN be squicky body horror. Or not if you don't want it to be.
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Apr 17, 2018 20:01
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Toplowtech posted:Minor madness rolls: Finding a mutilated corpse in a place where it’s least expected; witnessing a ritual sacrifice; discovering a parasite in one’s body. This is kind of to Serf's point that all of this is very easily excised by a GM though- the insanity and corruption rules can be easily removed/ignored, and even if they're run straight the DM controls how often you're finding unanticipated corpses, dealing with weird parasites, or having denizens of hell offer you contracts. They're mechanics that suit the default tone, which does have a significant body horror (and humor) element, but which the game does not even remotely need to function. If you do that and exercise reasonable judgement when it comes to things like monster tables (i.e. if you need inspiration for a demon's appearance and want to use the provided tables go with one of the many classical options or have it be a weird two-dimensional color blur rather than an animate pile of sewage) and don't have anyone use the very specifically Ultra-Evil-Magic tradition it'll pretty much run like a slightly grittier version of a bog-standard D&D-esque fantasy game. e: which I should also point out has optional rules for making it less gritty/more heroic, though just starting everyone at level 1 or level 3 goes a very long way LGD fucked around with this message at 23:20 on Apr 17, 2018 |
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Apr 17, 2018 23:16
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Forbidden Rules has variant rules for making PCs a little hardier as well.
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Apr 17, 2018 23:31
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Jeffrey of YOSPOS posted:Anyone ever try running a basic d&d module in this? I think it will work fine, just curious how it's been for others. I want to run deep carbon observatory(I'm in love) and SotDL seems to fit the mood perfectly while having all manner of modern niceties. This was the straw the broke the camel's back. I had heard a smattering of good things about Deep Carbon Observatory and I finally decided to breakdown and get it. It's pretty well written. http://www.rpgnow.com/product/131801/Deep-Carbon-Observatory It has a novel way of jumping the players into the plot by having them react quickly to a series of cascading events. The whole adventure feels like exploring Blighttown in Dark Souls. It starts off directly after a massive flood. Everything is swamp to one degree or another. And for the DMs there are plenty of devious methods to make blustery adventurers miserable. It encourages smart play. Here is an example of the quality of magic items you are going to encounter in this book: quote:The bow itself is a strip of laminated bone from the pivot-point of I found a Lets Play of Deep Carbon Observatory too. https://soundcloud.com/ggnorecast/40-lets-play-deep-carbon-observatory-part-1-carrowmore The players use the system Into the Odd rather than D&D so there are some differences but the campaign runs smoothly.
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Apr 18, 2018 03:55
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Serf posted:I'm working on a normie hack for the game, and when I get it into playable shape I'll drop it in this thread. Naar fucked around with this message at 17:09 on Apr 18, 2018 |
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Apr 18, 2018 17:06
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I know GMs who ignore corruption and insanity effects and they're all cowards.
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Apr 18, 2018 21:08
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Nanomashoes posted:I know GMs who ignore corruption and insanity effects and they're all cowards.
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Apr 18, 2018 21:13
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