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If anything the 60's does have some amazing plot hook like a different spin on the Cuban Missile Crisis. Or even the rise of the hippie movement.
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Sep 25, 2020 12:11
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Illuminatus by Robert Anton Wilson, or anything that he wrote, are also a good mine for inspiration. I stole some stuff from it for a technocracy Mage game I ran in high school.
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Sep 25, 2020 12:39
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Cooked Auto posted:I really don't want to think what that settings equivalent of the 1960's would be after having watched some Cold War documentaries. Wouldn't that basically be the backstory of Stross's A Colder War?
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Sep 25, 2020 15:24
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Cooked Auto posted:I really don't want to think what that settings equivalent of the 1960's would be after having watched some Cold War documentaries. You don't have to think it because Tim Powers already has. Everyone fucked around with this message at 15:36 on Sep 25, 2020 |
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Sep 25, 2020 15:33
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Drakyn posted:Wouldn't that basically be the backstory of Stross's A Colder War? Everyone posted:You don't have to think it because Tim Powers already has. I was catching up waiting to post both of these.
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Sep 25, 2020 15:59
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Knew about the first one, didn't know about the second one.
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Sep 25, 2020 16:44
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I feel like Cthulhutech's problem is it combines the wrong mecha show. All Shinji's real problems are coming from inside him or his family. It's really internally-focused. Instead they should use Getter Robo, which would fit much better with how people normally play RPGs and create some interesting spaces. Like, Getter Rays themselves are an eldritch abomination that wants to make humans more badass. So you'd have an external force trying to make your PCs stronger at the cost of their ability to relate to or participate in normal life. Which I feel is delightfully meta. You also have the idea that eventually humanity might make it to the big leagues, which scares the crap out of everyone else. The Getter team fought a lot of dudes who are time traveling back to prevent the Getter Emperor's existence. Gundam is probably too good a fit. An apocalyptic cult trying to destroy all life on Earth happens way too often. Just in the UC timeline you have Char's Counterattack, Iron Mask's Crossbone Vanguard, the Jupiter Empire (twice), the Angel Halo, and the Turn-A, although that's sort of the reverse, it destroyed everything humans had made that wasn't alive instead.
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Sep 25, 2020 17:17
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I should really read some Stross, but can certainly second Declare, that book staggered me.
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Sep 25, 2020 17:34
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It takes a Strength of 23 to lift The Deck of Encounters Set Two Part 79: The Deck of Ghosts and Giants 399: Family Reunion The PCs are in a cemetery “paying their respects,” because they have some kind of death wish. Stay the hell away from cemeteries. A “pale and unhealthy” man asks them to deliver a message to another graveyard. He’s a ghost. The message is to his wife, also a ghost. She suggests that the PCs help move her coffin to her husband’s graveyard. They’re only hanging on to undeath because they couldn’t be together. (The watchmen are going to have something to say about people digging up graves, though.) If they complete the task, the ghosts tell them where a treasure of 1,000 gp and a ring of free action is located. A graveyard… with friendly undead? Revolutionary! Keep. 400: This Old Cloud Castle The PCs are relaxing in a large meadow when they are engulfed in a strange, highly-magical fog. Shockingly and against everything an AD&D player would expect, they are not pulled into Ravenloft by the Dark Powers. Instead they’re summoned up to a cloud castle where a family of cloud giants live (married couple, three children). They believe the PCs to be interior decorators and have summoned them up to renovate their home. If the PCs honestly attempt to do this, it “requires a lot of fast-talking”... not to convince the giants that they’re actually the decorators, but rather because “the giants have absolutely no taste whatsoever.” After their job is complete, the cloud giants deposit them on the ground with a bag of 3,500 gold. They’re also hundreds of miles from where they started, because you know, clouds drift. Why yes, I do want my heroic adventure to suddenly turn into a makeover TV show. How did you know? Keep. 401: I’ve Got My Eye on You The PCs are travelling across craggy terrain and hear cries for help. It’s a “elf maiden” being held by a cyclops in an iron cage. The cyclops is getting a fire started for elf barbecue. So, you know, you could save the maiden or whatever. If you do, the cyclops will smack its lips at how delicious they look, attack with a burning branch, and will throw boulders while fleeing if it needs to escape. So there’s some personality there, at least. If the PCs save this nameless elf maiden and escort her back to her tribe, they will “reward the PCs with three arrows +1.” Th… thanks? I guess? It’s.... pretty plain. But I guess sometimes you just wanna save an elf maiden. Though actually, I’m probably gonna make this elf a dude and entertain myself by describing him as Orlando Bloom as Legolas, without saying that directly. Keep. 402: Two Heads Are Better than One “The PCs have been enjoying a picnic…” like you do in D&D… when an ettin crashes out of a shrubbery, looking for a tricky halfling thief and smashing up everyone else along the way. The card says this is best when there’s only a couple PCs who can’t just curbstomp the ettin, because it really wants you to do something clever… ish… like getting the two heads to fight, or confusing them with questions or whatever. So yeah, not that clever. I dunno. There's no info on the thief or why, specfically, the ettin is angry, which seems like a big gap. But the basic concept is sound. Keep? 403: A Hot Time Tonight On the fringes of farming country, four teen fire giants (or three; the card contradicts itself) are here being hooligans. Smashing buildings (though not humans), etc. They can be driven off by strong resistance, or, potentially, by a stern talking-to. The card doesn’t mention it explicitly, but presumably killing any of these guys would escalate fire giant/small-squishy-people tensions dramatically. Keep. Dallbun fucked around with this message at 17:43 on Sep 25, 2020 |
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Sep 25, 2020 17:40
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Ultiville posted:I should really read some Stross, but can certainly second Declare, that book staggered me. Declare is so good I think I'm going start rereading it again right now. Thanks, thread!
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Sep 25, 2020 17:46
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Dallbun posted:400: This Old Cloud Castle This is content post, but I genuinely love this. Lots of space for players to get inventive and stretch creative muscles, plus it's really cute.
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Sep 25, 2020 17:59
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Ultiville posted:I should really read some Stross, but can certainly second Declare, that book staggered me. Some of Stross's stuff isn't as good as the others, but when he's on his game he's really on his game. I specifically like that while he might not write the hardest sci-fi out there, he's very happy to go "look just give me these three premises and you can just treat them as magic or whatever, and I'm going to then spin out very logically what would happen from there, okay?" Also I know lots of people hate The Laundry Files books for reasons I will never understand, but I will stan for them to my dying day.
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Sep 25, 2020 18:01
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The Deck of Encounters has many duds, but it's so worth it for the times when it's 'on', so to speak. E: I also appreciate the rowdy Giant teens you can give a stern talking to.
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Sep 25, 2020 18:12
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Yeah, three of those deck cards were great (ghosts who want to be together, teen fire giants, interior decorating) which is way above average for the Deck.
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Sep 25, 2020 18:17
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And the two that weren't are... fine. There's nothing wrong with them. This was a good draw from the deck, all things considered.
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Sep 25, 2020 18:34
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I would still keep the elf BBQ because with only a quick stroke of the pen it turns into a provision vendor rather than a fight and the players will be none the wiser. "You meet a congenial cyclops who offers to sell you his prized jerky" can easily be sandwiched between the two friendly encounters with the cloud giants and the ghosts.
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Sep 25, 2020 19:51
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Ultiville posted:I should really read some Stross, but can certainly second Declare, that book staggered me. You'll find that Stross tends to find a good elevator pitch and clog it up with intolerable self-inserts, magical realmery and some weird-rear end stereotypic portrayals of homosexuals. So, uh, I would recommend against reading Stross.
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Sep 25, 2020 20:02
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I burned out on Stross when the ending of a book hinged on a deus ex machina that came out of nowhere. Even if the bigger issue was that it also involved a "I am super amazing and perfect" kind of character being done in by that thing in the dumbest way possible. Also the politics were a bit of a mouthful in that it was a bit too... backpatting in a utopian way. I kinda liked Halting State but man did he ever crawl up his own rear end in a top hat with the sequel. Cooked Auto fucked around with this message at 20:14 on Sep 25, 2020 |
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Sep 25, 2020 20:11
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 Part 4: Lemurian to Puppet Master  Lemurian: You’re a member of an ape-like race who won their freedom from their Atlantean masters. Your people watch over the ruins of their former oppressors which still brim with technology and sorcery of great and terrible power. You are very much a martial class, with 1d14 hit die (that’s not a typo), proficiency in most martial weapons, and use the critical hit table and can perform Mighty Deeds of Arms as a Warrior. You also get a third action die at 10th level, one of the few classes that can do so by default in this book. As for your other abilities, you add your Stamina modifier to your Armor Class but it does not stack with worn armor, you roll one step higher on the dice chain when operating ancient technological devices, can enter a rage-like battle fury that lets you roll 2 die higher on the dice chain for your Deed Die, can add your Deed Die to tasks involving physical strength, and can Detect Magic via scent albeit with no corruption/taint/magical maladies of said Wizard spell. You do have a role-playing related weakness: you must either roll for or choose from a d12 table at least 3 rules of “honorable combat,” and intentionally disregarding them will cause you to be exiled and hunted down by your kin. They include things such as never attacking a foe from behind, never surrendering, always giving your enemies a chance to repent and surrender, and so on and so forth. The Lemurian’s a pretty cool class, both from a mechanical and flavor standpoint. They are very clearly warriors, but their ability to “smell sorcery” and better understand advanced technology is a pretty good utility feature. Monster Trainer: You’re part of a society that sends its children out to collect and tame monsters, and engage in competitive battles with other such trainers for fame and glory. You have a d6 hit die and a small array of weapon proficiencies, and the vast majority of your class features center around creatures you capture and control rather than your own skills and talents. You begin play with a monster akin to a Wizard’s familiar, but can keep up to 4 other creatures plus your level as loyal companions. Creatures who are near-death in combat can be captured should they fail a Will save minus your level and Personality bonus, becoming your permanent companion on a failure. Tamed monsters can be called and dismissed from an extradimensional storage space and controlled, although those with more Hit Dice than the Monster Trainer’s level have a chance at resisting orders via a Will save. Beyond this major feature, Monster Trainers can also heal the wounds of their companions on a per-day basis, can add and burn luck to assist their companions’ actions, and can evolve monsters with HD lower than their level after a fight. We even have a small random table of potential new abilities gained via evolution to make said monsters feel like they gained more than just a hit point boost! Much like the Jockey, the Monster Trainer is highly dependent upon what monsters are encountered, although they’re probably more powerful than said class on account of the Luck-sharing and granting new Hit Dice and abilities to weaker monsters. Ninja Vampire: You are part of an order of undead assassins who serve dark gods that demand payment in blood and loyalty. You have a startlingly-fragile d4 hit die, are proficient in a broad variety of reflavored Japanese weapons (katana is a longsword, shuriken is a dart, etc), and use the critical hit table of an Undead monster. You can call upon your god’s magic much like a cleric can. You cannot turn undead or lay on hands, but you can cast spells from potentially any class provided that they meet your god’s area of influence (GM’s discretion). You are also trained in Thief skills, and being undead you have the typical strengths and weaknesses of such a creature. Furthermore, you must drink 1 hit point of damage of blood per day in order to survive (which adds to your own hit point reserves), and you catch fire in sunlight unless dressed in ninja garb. You also cannot die via normal means when reduced to 0 HP unless you’re burned, staked through the heart, or decapitated. Overall this is a rather strong class. Your spell selection is quite broad, although the pantheon the Ninja Vampires serve have rather specific in portfolio (Kagutsuchi is the God of Fire, Nai-No-Kami is the God of Earthquakes, etc). You are actually quite resilient in spite of your Hit Die, and since your blood drain isn’t restricted to humanoids you can very easily subsist off of animals rather than risk earning the ire of townsfolk. Ogre: You’re an ogre, and you love to eat! You have a d10 hit die and are proficient in any weapon that can “chop, skewer, or pulverize” which sounds like most of them. However you have a slow movement speed, armor must be custom-made and you outgrow it when you gain a level due to your gluttonous appetite, and if you go 24 hours without eating you fall under GM control as a starving beast unless you burn Luck. But you can gain a third Action die at 10th level, perform Meaty Deeds of Feasting which are akin to Mighty Deeds but performed when hungry or around food. Sample Meaty Deeds are centered around this gluttonous theme: ahungry bellow that increases critical threat range vs a prey that you intend to eat, eating the small body part of an opponent, and such. You also gain a natural bite attack whose damage die increases via level, and you use a special Gobble critical hit table when biting and grappling. All ogres have a favorite food (goats, pies, dwarves, etc) selected at 1st level, and can smell said food anywhere from 40 feet to 100 depending on circumstance. A rather humorous warrior, albeit weighed down (haha) by quite a bit of weaknesses in exchange for some rather thematic combat features. I cannot help but compare the Ogre to the Lemurian, and the latter class comes up stronger. A better Hit Die, a broader “smell” utility ability, and likelier to maintain a better Armor Class as they increase in level. Going through plate mail gets expensive, you know!  Puppet Master: You’re a creepy spellcaster who can imbue dolls with life and limited sapience. You’re pretty much a pure caster at 1d4 hit die, although you have a better variety of weapon proficiencies such as swords and bows on top of the iconic “wizard weapons.” Like the Jockey and Monster Trainer you’re minion-centric, although unlike those classes you have more concrete stats and abilities for your marionettes, puppets, and all manner of dolls. You need 50 gp of materials and two weeks to build such a creature, and can bring to life a puppet permanently via the sacrifice of Intelligence (you regain lost Intelligence if the puppet’s destroyed or disenchanted). Puppets are small and not very tough, but you can grant a puppet additional abilities with more gold pieces and/or Intelligence, ranging from proper inbuilt armor, a telepathic link, a flying speed, a more damaging weapon, and so on and so forth. You automatically know the Mending spell for healing your puppets, have a small array of spells you can pick from a list (mostly utility stuff), and you can also transfer your mind into a puppet if you die. You can make some surprisingly strong puppets if you have the gold and Intelligence to spare, and as a “minion class” you have action economy on your side. Your power level is less wonky than the Jockey or Monster Trainer on account that you’re limited in specific ways, and just about every D&D clone has adventures with gold pieces to be won. Thoughts So Far: Some pretty strong classes with neat thematics in this section. The only one I really have anything negative to say about is the Ogre. The Ninja Vampire’s major class features feel a bit unimaginative in borrowing from others (cleric casting, thief skills) although the novelty of being able to drink blood and undead immunities makes up for it in appeal. Join us next time as we cover more classes, from the Trekkian Quantum Wanderer to the spacy Ubiquarian! Libertad! fucked around with this message at 20:49 on Sep 26, 2020 |
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Sep 25, 2020 22:19
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Laundry was great up to Apocalypse Codex. The books that came after have the same problem as the end stage Discworld books: too much rolling around in a slurry of established setting elements and characters, not enough plot and things actually happening. The alternate POV characters are nice, but their voices are similar enough to Bob's that they don't really add a lot. Whatever the next book in the series is, I hope it wraps the whole thing up, so Stross can stop writing them out of a sense of obligation. Related, I did a two post mini-review of the Laundry RPG in the Cthulhu Megathread. It's an interesting twist on the Call of Cthulhu formula, though nothing to run home about mechanically. One Two
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Sep 25, 2020 23:07
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Amusingly Apocalypse Codex was the book I stopped at and barely started at. Guess I got off the train ahead of time. 
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Sep 25, 2020 23:11
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Late to the Cthulhu talk, but just suddenly remember how Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the earth involved a raid on the deep ones, with a pre-director J. Edgar Hoover as an important NPC that causes a game over if he dies. I think I would've like to see a setting where Hoover didn't get to use the FBI as his personal vendetta machine.
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Sep 25, 2020 23:36
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Robindaybird posted:Late to the Cthulhu talk, but just suddenly remember how Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the earth involved a raid on the deep ones, with a pre-director J. Edgar Hoover as an important NPC that causes a game over if he dies. At least in that game Hoover is portrayed as the exact kind of absolute piece of poo poo he was.
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Sep 25, 2020 23:37
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mellonbread posted:Laundry was great up to Apocalypse Codex. The books that came after have the same problem as the end stage Discworld books: too much rolling around in a slurry of established setting elements and characters, not enough plot and things actually happening. The alternate POV characters are nice, but their voices are similar enough to Bob's that they don't really add a lot. Whatever the next book in the series is, I hope it wraps the whole thing up, so Stross can stop writing them out of a sense of obligation. Strong disagree cause I actually like the books more and more and Stross has made it clear he only writes a book if he has a good idea. But I might be making GBS threads up the thread so if you feel that way too you can e-mail me at xiahoudunsa@gmail. (And while I like the Laundry books I'll fully own to it at least partially being a thing because me and my dad read them so it has warm fuzzy feelings that might not be in the actual books.) But if I was going to advertise his writing I'd go with Accelerondo and Halting State and if someone picked up anything in The Family Trade series I'd slap it out of their hand and make them eat soap.
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Sep 26, 2020 03:47
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mellonbread posted:Laundry was great up to Apocalypse Codex. The books that came after have the same problem as the end stage Discworld books: too much rolling around in a slurry of established setting elements and characters, not enough plot and things actually happening. The alternate POV characters are nice, but their voices are similar enough to Bob's that they don't really add a lot. Conversely, I think Apocalyopse Codex is where things got interesting. For one, I grew up reading my mom's collection of Modesty Blaise so BASHFUL INCENDIARY is my jam, characters who aren't Bob greatly help offset Bob's... dated early 2000s disaffected smarter-than-everyone nerd-ness, and it's where Stross starts to build a more cohesive setting than just Lovecraft-flavoured pastiches (even if Apocalypse Codex is itself O'Donnel pastiche). They're still a bit of a mixed bag, but Rhesus Chart and Nightmare Stacks are some of my favourite in the series. The latter books is also where Stross starts upsetting the status quo of the setting, which I've found really captivating in that it's showing the inevitable apocalypse the setting has been building towards actually happening, rather than always moving it ahead of the series. It could stand to be less het, though. More lesbian vampires, I say.
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Sep 26, 2020 05:03
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LatwPIAT posted:It could stand to be less het, though. More lesbian vampires, I say. Advice for life, really.
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Sep 26, 2020 05:10
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By popular demand posted:Humanity slowly waking up to realize we are all right in the middle of a galactic/eldrich cold war and planet Earth is as likely a flashpoint as Berlin in 1952 would make for a terrific espionage/xcom fusion campaign. Reminded that this is basically the concept of the Men in Black movies and cartoon; Earth is an entire planet that's basically the equivalent of feudal Japan whose authorities are pretending the rest of the universe is empty and uninhabited, and as a result is an apolitical neutral zone in a very active universe and the perfect place for refugees, fugitives and spies to hide. And some versions of Transformers that actually try to justify the central premise play up how it's basically two alien superpowers playing guerrilla warfare on a backwater planet, usually right before things turn hot.
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Sep 26, 2020 06:44
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In the transformers comics earth is stuck in a cordoned off backwater because the rest of the galaxy got sick of the robot civil war spilling out into their territory. The robot civil war that has been running for 4 million years.
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Sep 26, 2020 06:54
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LatwPIAT posted:Conversely, I think Apocalyopse Codex is where things got interesting. For one, I grew up reading my mom's collection of Modesty Blaise so BASHFUL INCENDIARY is my jam, characters who aren't Bob greatly help offset Bob's... dated early 2000s disaffected smarter-than-everyone nerd-ness, and it's where Stross starts to build a more cohesive setting than just Lovecraft-flavoured pastiches (even if Apocalypse Codex is itself O'Donnel pastiche). They're still a bit of a mixed bag, but Rhesus Chart and Nightmare Stacks are some of my favourite in the series. The latter books is also where Stross starts upsetting the status quo of the setting, which I've found really captivating in that it's showing the inevitable apocalypse the setting has been building towards actually happening, rather than always moving it ahead of the series. This is just reminding me that my main beef with the Laundry Files series is that the titles have absolutely nothing to do with the actual events of the plot, and so I can never remember what actually happens in which book. That said, I do enjoy the books, and I like how they settled on a far less problematic explanation for the old Lovecraftian Madness trope: doing, or even thinking too hard about, the higher-dimensional math that constitutes "magic" attracts the extra dimensional equivalent of bacteria that eat tiny chunks of your brain matter, leading to symptoms somewhere between Alzheimers and Kreuzfeld-Jakob. Once Alan Turing figured out how to conjure spirits from the vasty deep with a computer, the whole thing got much safer.
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Sep 26, 2020 08:39
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GimpInBlack posted:This is just reminding me that my main beef with the Laundry Files series is that the titles have absolutely nothing to do with the actual events of the plot, and so I can never remember what actually happens in which book. The titles often refer to a plot-critical text, but yeah, it's an issue trying to remember all of those. Rhesus Chart is easy because it's the one about vampires, Annihilation Score is the one where a musical instrument is important so that's not too bad, but which of Apocalypse Codex and Nightmare Stacks was the one about the faeries? Was it the codex warning of the faerie apocalypse, or the stack of nightmare scenarios where one is about faeries? GimpInBlack posted:That said, I do enjoy the books, and I like how they settled on a far less problematic explanation for the old Lovecraftian Madness trope Another thing that I basically didn't realise until I read the roleplaying game, but that I actually really like, is how as the series progresses Stross is writing about an increasingly heterogeneous alliance of human-adjacent monsters teaming up to survive CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN, instead of the Lovecraftian total xenophobia where all monsters are the evil other. It's a nice reversal, to see humans, vampires, deep ones, and elves huddle together for warmth in the cold, uncaring universe. Especially with how there's an outline for how vampire society is by nature cut-throat dog-eat-dog ruling over humans, and then Alex and Bob's ex-girlfriend show that, no, actually they can live in harmony with humanity and each other. It's not easy but it's something that is worth striving for. It makes for a setting where counter-occult intelligence's strength is not purging the heretic, the mutant, and the alien, but multiculturalism.
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Sep 26, 2020 12:40
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Robindaybird posted:Late to the Cthulhu talk, but just suddenly remember how Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the earth involved a raid on the deep ones, with a pre-director J. Edgar Hoover as an important NPC that causes a game over if he dies. Little known fact, but that entire game is based on CoC RPG campaign Escape from Innsmouth. Like, literally every scene and location. I've run the raid section from it before and it's pretty intense, swapping between five different military teams as the action ramps up.
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Sep 26, 2020 14:28
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GimpInBlack posted:This is just reminding me that my main beef with the Laundry Files series is that the titles have absolutely nothing to do with the actual events of the plot, and so I can never remember what actually happens in which book. The funny part is that makes me think of midichlorians.
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Sep 26, 2020 15:39
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A silver cord always leads from your body to The Deck of Encounters Set Two Part 80: The Deck of Gibberlings and Githyanki 404: Cold Shoulder “The PCs are in a bad situation; they hoped they could prevent a host giant invasion of the lowlands under the Giantshoulder mountains, but their mission has been a failure so far. The encounter begins at their last meeting with the host giant Chieftain.” AAAAAAARGH pass. Anyway, basically the chieftain insults the puniness of small humanoids and pushes for a one-on-one challenge between a PC and a giant champion, and if the PC wins they’ll forestall the invasion by a week, time that the local human ruler desperately needs to muster their army. Sounds like a cool Against the Giants campaign you’ve got going there, card-writer. Not sure how it relates to my own game, though. 405: Mob Scream The PCs are resting in a dungeon, ideally when they think they’ve pretty much cleared out the danger. They haven’t, because here come two hundred loving gibberlings! The card has other words to say, but nothing of import. It’s almost so dumb, pointless, and random that it swings back around to awesome. But not actually. Pass. 406: We’re Not from Around Here The PCs are up north in them cold regions, and hear rumors of strange lights even further north. Trappers and woodmen in the area have seen lights like this before, but never quite so bright. It turns out to be a small spelljammer manned by githzerai (eleven fighters in addition to their spelljammer-mandated mage), who are effecting minor repairs on their ship. They’re friendly, but also scouting for a possible invasion/colonization effort, and will consider kidnapping one or more PCs as information sources. If you’re willing to run a vanilla AD&D campaign and drop in Spelljammer material in on a whim, then, uh, sure. And let’s say I am willing to do that. Keep. 407: Raiders from Beyond Eleven githyanki attack! They came to plunder the Prime Material for food and treasure! One of them is an invisible illusionist! They ask you to surrender, but they plan to kill you anyway! Roll for initiative! Pass! 408: Stone Cold In a desert, night is falling, and the PCs see a pyramid ahead that might provide shelter against the cold. Is this like the desert version of the “convenient cave or manor house in the distance just as a storm is brewing” scenario? There are three stone golems by the entrance that try to stop you from entering, but not that hard - you can actually just dodge around them and they’ll leave you be once you’re inside. Which explains why the inside has been pretty much looted over the centuries. There is a command word for controlling the golems in hieroglyphics on the walls, though, which you might be able to learn if you have the “Ancient History” or… “”Languages”?... NWP, neither of which really exist? There is a “Languages, Ancient,” proficiency in the PHB, but you have to, you know, pick one. There can be other stuff in the pyramid at the DM’s option, but the main event is that when the party leaves, the golems try to follow them and attack if they don’t say the command word. If the party does know the command word, I guess they’ve got three iron golems! Pretty dang sweet, though this is for high-level characters, of course. I might just make it… one iron golem, depending. But keep
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Sep 26, 2020 16:08
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wiegieman posted:In the transformers comics earth is stuck in a cordoned off backwater because the rest of the galaxy got sick of the robot civil war spilling out into their territory. As a side note I would love to play in a game set after said civil war ends because it seems like an interesting setting to mess around with. What the hell do you do with yourself as an individual and a species where for longer then human civilization has existed all you have done is fight and now it is all over.
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Sep 26, 2020 17:00
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Something that's bothered me for years: where do gibberlings, which have no discernable society or industry, manage to get all these shortswords? Like it'd be one thing if they had random assortments of pointy poo poo they found, but it's specified to be mass-produced shortswords. I know, I know, D&D ecology is a rabbit hole that breaks the strongest men, but it's so drat specific.
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Sep 26, 2020 17:10
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Clearly, they're armed by the Derro in a continued attempt to wage their genocidal war upon the Other through screaming, unyielding proxies. Clearly, their weapons are all scavenged from abandoned and forgotten svirfneblin outposts, the only equipment they could understand. Clearly, they are merely a zealous and militant order from a prosperous but xenophobic gibberling culture that largely keeps itself secreted away from the outside world. Clearly, it's an aboleth's very long running art installation.
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Sep 26, 2020 18:12
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Big Mad Drongo posted:Something that's bothered me for years: where do gibberlings, which have no discernable society or industry, manage to get all these shortswords? Like it'd be one thing if they had random assortments of pointy poo poo they found, but it's specified to be mass-produced shortswords. The Adventurer-Industrial complex is mass-producing shortswords for level 1 adventurers at a loss due to government subsidies, the spare shortswords, rather than being melted down or put into storage, are just tossed into a big hole outside of town. That's where the gibberlings get them all.
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Sep 26, 2020 19:24
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The gibberlings are so pointless, their description almost reaches cool.
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Sep 26, 2020 20:35
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Part 5: Quantum Wanderer to Ubiquarian  Quantum Wanderer: You’re a traveler of time and space who just happened to end up in a more primitive dimension/era. Your technology relies on the invisible manipulation of quantum physics, retro gadgets, and ray guns which all appear miraculously magical to most people. You have a d7 hit die, are proficient in 1d5+3 random weapons reflective of your sufficiently advanced culture, are likely to be knowledgeable and proficient in the workings of super-science weapons found as treasure, and have good progression in all 3 saving throws. Your major class feature, Quantum Manipulation, grants you access to Q-Powers as you gain levels, allowing you to perform “magical” feats of science provided that you can gather enough Q-particles to ‘cast’ them. This is represented as a 1d12 check with modifiers based upon how strange and wonky the laws of physics are in the immediate vicinity (magical rifts and such) as well as penalties if you failed prior checks within a short time-frame. You can learn up to 5 Q-Powers as you gain levels, but there’s only 4 (technically 9) in this book with suggestions that the GM should create more of their own. They include the ability to make a force field bubble that boosts AC, the ability to “wager Luck” on a roll that can aid or hinder the rolls of others, being able to teleport oneself and/or a group, and the ability to shoot an energy ray with various effects and/or damage types depending on its kind. Devolution rays reduce mental ability scores but enhance physical ones, rectangle rays create square-shaped holes in walls, teleportation rays can transfer a struck target elsewhere as the base teleport power, and so on and so forth. The rays are learned individually and there are 6 of them, which may account for the brevity of Q-Powers. There’s also a sample list of Quantum Age weapons which include various types of energy blasters and a paralyzing rod. The class leans strongly on utility in the form of its Q-Powers, although given the limited amount that you can learn you’re mostly limited to a neat trick or two for the first five levels. Ro-Bard: You’re a metallic artificial life form programmed to move others through the power of music! You have a d8 hit die and “roguish” weapon proficiencies, and your artificial body grants you diverse immunities but the inability to heal damage naturally or magically save via repairs costing 2d4 silver pieces per hit point restored. You have an inbuilt instrument that doesn’t require hands to be played and thus cannot be disarmed, and your memory data functions similar to Bardic Knowledge. Your primary class features center around music, and the abilities in question are dependent upon your alignment. All Ro-Bards can inspire allies with bonuses on Will saves. Lawful Ro-Bards can implant multiple suggestions in listeners, and can easily pick up new languages. Neutral Ro-Bards can only implant a single suggestion that grants a bonus when the listener performs a task related to the desired course of action, can also cause people to dance via a failed Will save, and evoke a specific emotional response in a target via singing. Chaotic Ro-Bards can perform acrobatics to increase their AC or ignore difficult and hazardous terrain, their jests can impose penalties to a target’s rolls, and they can perform stage magic and said last ability is incredibly vague in what it can do beyond this. The Ro-Bard kind of comes out of nowhere, and given the classes we already covered that’s saying something. The alignment-based class features are a strange choice, and I cannot help but notice that the Lawful features get the short end of the stick. The Ro-Bard as a class doesn’t really have access to combat capabilities, magic, or otherwise broad gimmicks like we’ve seen in past entries, and given that it takes money to heal hit point damage they are a rather “meh” class. Slimenoid: You’re a humanoid slime, meaning that all you weebs out there can play your very own gooey monster girl. You aren't exactly a combat-focused or utility class, having a limited mixture of both. You have a d8 hit die and cannot wear armor or use any weapons, which is not good, although you can attack with an acidic pseudopod which increases in damage and reach as you gain levels. Furthermore, you gain a unique array of class features every level, such as being able to see in the dark, breathe underwater, take half damage from bludgeoning attacks but double from fire/dessication, and a gradual progression of immunities. Being counted as “no longer humanoid for spell purposes” is the class’ 10th level capstone. I actually looked through the corebook’s (very long) magic chapter with a proper CTRL + F search, and there aren’t many spells which specifically key off of a humanoid target. Charm Person is the most obvious example, but as a final feature is rather underwhelming. Sadly this word sums up the class quite well, as you don’t really excel in many utility-based tasks, you don’t have spells, and you are quite fragile and easy to hit in a straight-up fight.  Tenacious D-Fender: You’re basically the protagonist of Brutal Legend, and what more needs to be said? You are a martial class through and through. Your Tenacious Deeds are like Mighty Deeds of Arms but lower base die value than the Warrior.To make up for this you add your Personality modifier to the Deed die, are proficient with all melee weapons, and you add your level to initiative rolls meaning you act first and and fast often. You have a rather low d8 hit die and can only use slings as ranged weapons (cuz ROCK!), but your major class features are Battle Cries which are songs you sing in combat to make cool stuff happen and you have a predetermined one song per level. All but one are named after songs or catchphrases performed by the band Tenacious D and tend to be either at-will abilities or limited on a per-day basis. Battle Cries include things such as granting you an extra attack, deafening foes in an AoE shout, forcing up to 8 targets to lose their next action, and so on. The last two songs are rather notable: Tribute! can let allies roll one higher on the dice chain on attack rolls, while Summon Type IV Dio calls forth a powerful demon with the face of Ronnie James Dio. This class is awesome. I have absolutely nothing to criticize about it, and it’s my favorite one in the whole book. Ubiquarian: You learned how to astrally project a mirror-self via meditative techniques. As expected you’re rather thief-like in your d6 hit die and weapon proficiencies, and you can select from a list of trances to perform via a d20 roll plus your level + stamina modifier. These techniques can let you send an immaterial, invisible astral projection as you leave your body (but suffer Stamina if you remain outside your body for too long), can heal injuries and lost Stamina damage from projecting after an hour-long meditation, can create physical copies of yourself which divide your Stamina and hit points among themselves, gain the ability to Move Silently and Move in Shadows as a Thief (constant ability, not a trance), and can bring other people in an astral meditation by increasing the DC. Failing a roll when using said abilities causes an Astral Mishap, which is a table of various effects ranging from ability score damage to suffering from short-term amnesia to bringing a monster from the astral plane back with you. The Ubiquarian is a gimmicky class, but it has a very cool and versatile gimmick. It may not be as open-ended as some of the other thief-like classes in this book such as the Knave or Ninja Vampire, but it’s much easier to read through and understand the core abilities. Thoughts so far: I wasn’t impressed with the first 3 entries here, but the Tenacious D-Fender and Ubiquarians are cool classes that are good at their intended roles with flavorful spins of existing classes. Heavy Metal Warrior and Astral Thief are both brief and cool-sounding. Join us next time as we wrap up this review with the last five classes, from vicious Velociraptors to wild-eyed Zealots! Libertad! fucked around with this message at 05:49 on Sep 28, 2020 |
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Sep 26, 2020 20:43
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| # ? Jun 7, 2024 22:49 |
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summon 
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Sep 26, 2020 22:08
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