|
theironjef posted:Still though, what's overconfidence specifically in this context? TK_Nyarlathotep posted:A slow and insidious killer.  what a perfectly teed-up post
|
#
?
Nov 16, 2020 07:10
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 23, 2024 09:52 |
|
|
Serf posted:grouping mods with the core rules irks me. mods should be broken out into their own section because when you're trying to read through the core rules you get sidetracked by pages of optional rules or twists on those rules, and it makes learning the system more complicated than it needs to be. What should have happened with the mods is that the book presented the core mechanics in their entirety, then went on to present the different variants, using layout (e.g. sidebars and tags) to break them out into thematically-appropriate collections of variant rules, and then included robust examples walking you through how and why to pick specific mods for specific genres and themes. Instead you have to wait 90 pages for the start of the setting chapter to get a pithy one-sentence description of a bunch of genres with no explanation of how those tie to specific rule mods, followed by a handful of vague 2-3 short paragraph setups for specific genre mashups that only exist as wink-wink-nudge-nudge allusions to previous Cortex/Cortex Plus game, without going into any kind of analysis or depth about why the game is telling you to use specific mods (because it's just telling you what to pick to recreate the rules of those games, but that's useless to anyone who's actually trying to figure out what mods to use to make their own game; also, it doesn't even include Marvel Heroic as an example  ).The mod layout especially sucks because if you want to build out a game/setting and then tell players what mods to use, you have to give them a long list of stuff that they constantly need to look up and not confuse for any other similar variant in the book, or else give up and create your own rulebook by copy-pasting bits of the handbook. And in fact, since they've moved to a whole web-based rulebook thing, it's baffling that they don't have an option to create a "custom rulebook" that includes only specific rules/mods that you could then distribute as a player-facing resource. Lemon-Lime fucked around with this message at 11:52 on Nov 16, 2020 |
|
#
?
Nov 16, 2020 11:42
|
|
|
TK_Nyarlathotep posted:A slow and insidious killer.  Yeah, by overconfidence I meant that when a player describes their attack as "I want to thread my missile barrage through the Faberge egg collection and past the hostages", I just have to nod. There's no "ooh, I hope for a [whatever the game calls complications]!". Which makes me sound like a bit of a dick, maybe. I'm definitely in favor of being a fan of the players and I want my players to do awesome stuff. For those without Sentinels, it has five action types: Attack, Defend, Boost, Hinder, and Overcome. Overcome is the generic "do stuff" action, and it's the only one with any option for side effects. That's all I was saying - I've become accustomed to any roll being fodder for setbacks/side effects/complications, and having most of the game (especially Attacks) not have that possibility of mitigating shenanigans is missed. Serf posted:really? what are your criticisms of sentinels' balancing? i know i've had my frustrations with pbta and fitd in the past, where if players stack their stats/moves in just the right ways it becomes very difficult to challenge them My balance critiques are threefold, the more I play. One, there are trap options. Take the Elemental Manipulator, for example. A bunch of the abilities do damage to the hero, and you're expected to take the "my element heals me" ability. But if you're not mechanics savvy, you might miss this and just think the abilities are so powerful that you have to take a cost. It's especially egregious when you look at things like the Armored, which just mandate you get the Damage Resistance ability. Why they didn't do the same for Elemental Manipulator, etc., is beyond me. This is a side-effect, I think, of the fact that Sentinels isn't trying to be a generic Silver-Age superhero campaign, but recreate board game mechanics from the tabletop (e.g., the Elemental Manipulator isn't meant to recreate Ice Man or whatever, it's very clearly meant to be Absolute Zero). Two, the classes aren't balanced. Some paths are just stronger than others. You can easily end up with a character whose max Power die is a d8, and another with a d12, and the d8's Abilities aren't necessarily stronger. And this is a problem because of my lament above due to shenanigans. In a game like PbtA or Genesys or Fate or whatever, where you have mixed successes, the difference and applicability of Fire vs Ice might matter in how you interpret a setback. In Sentinels, Attacks can't even miss or fail. They always succeed, and they always do damage. (Which is on trope and I'm not complaining about not being able to miss.) With no way to make Fire vs Ice meaningful in a fight, the d12 is just always better than the d8. There's a lot of this, where one character can just be inferior across the board to another. But this is just bad balance. The reason I think the game goes from bad to really, atrociously bad is that the NPC balance is just awful. It is laughably easy to make a villain who is a pushover or is a murderbot or is beatable but just a boring slog, and there is no indication in the rules that this is true. You regularly might think you're making a tough villain and they get wrapped up in two rounds, and then you make a villain who is meant to be a mini-boss and they end up taking out two characters almost immediately, and they're made using the same rules. That's going to happen some times, in any game. Best laid plans, etc. But in a game that is, at its core, about rumbles between superheroes and villains, and is really, really not about anything else, I would expect the variance in the battles to be lower. It's incredibly frustrating to build up a villain and then have the rules not support it. I haven't had to fudge numbers this much since I played D&D. I suspect this is not a critique of the core mechanics. I really like a lot of the pacing mechanisms in the game, and am hybridizing Sentinels and MHRP to solve the problems I have with each for the next season. I think the game was designed by one group, but then all the classes, abilities, etc., were made by another group, and it shows. Watching the actual plays by the team at Greater Than Games, I think there's a lot of hand-waving of rules in favor of cool narrative in their RPG play-style, but the fact that Sentinels is a narrative RPG doesn't preclude the need for balance. Lemon-Lime posted:And in fact, since they've moved to a whole web-based rulebook thing, it's baffling that they don't have an option to create a "custom rulebook" that includes only specific rules/mods that you could then distribute as a player-facing resource. As I noted above, my understanding is that's the plan, but it's been a long and rocky rollout. I do think Fandom is trapped between a rock and a hard place. If they had released a single game as a throughline, a lot of the Kickstarter backers would have been (justifiably) angry. So they release the complete rules, but in many people's minds, the mods "are" the rules. The Discord is full of people who've only played, say, Marvel Heroic, and are shocked to discover that things like the Doom Pool aren't the default assumption. The Doom Pool is by far the most common task resolution system for most experienced Cortex players, but it's not the simplest. They chose the simplest one as their task resolution system, but if they had buried the Doom Pool later they would have confused a lot of fans as well. I'm not defending their choices, but I absolutely understand them.
|
|
#
?
Nov 16, 2020 17:49
|
|
|
CitizenKeen posted:Lemon-Lime has served you up, but for me... I think this is actually the perfect system for me to hack into what I've been trying to create, and your explanation really sold me on it. Thanks!
|
|
#
?
Nov 16, 2020 18:07
|
|
|
CitizenKeen posted:I do think Fandom is trapped between a rock and a hard place. If they had released a single game as a throughline, a lot of the Kickstarter backers would have been (justifiably) angry. So they release the complete rules, but in many people's minds, the mods "are" the rules. Yes, it's clear the Handbook is something that should have come out after an actual, full game built using the system, rather than months in advance of one. It's great content but an absolutely terrible introduction to the system.
|
|
#
?
Nov 16, 2020 22:17
|
|
|
CitizenKeen posted:
I get this. Makes sense if your playstyle involves laying collateral damage traps all over the place to force the players to do a careful thing. That's not a style I personally care about so it didn't occur to me. Not to say I don't like seeing stuff blow up and the players get in trouble, I just usually prefer to let them do it and tell me about it. I suppose you could offer them a different die (min to mid, mid to max) in exchange for triggering a minor twist, but yeah, it's not likely anyone would take you up on it. To me it's just never been an issue because in the comics stories I try to replicate there's usually very little "And then Squirrel Girl gets too puffed up with herself and accidentally puts an acorn through a hostage's head."
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 02:52
|
|
|
It's the tail.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 03:01
|
|
|
theironjef posted:I get this. Makes sense if your playstyle involves laying collateral damage traps all over the place to force the players to do a careful thing. That's not a style I personally care about so it didn't occur to me. Not to say I don't like seeing stuff blow up and the players get in trouble, I just usually prefer to let them do it and tell me about it. I suppose you could offer them a different die (min to mid, mid to max) in exchange for triggering a minor twist, but yeah, it's not likely anyone would take you up on it. That's not my play style at all. When I was running Spectaculars, my players were mildly perplexed that they would never miss. I told them, "Spider-Man almost never misses, just other bad things happen along the way. He knocks the villain over, but then the villain's rocket knocks a helicopter out of the sky and now Spider-Man has to go deal with that as well." It's not about collateral damage traps, it's about allowing interesting things to flow from the fiction that don't feel like I'm taking an assertive action to introduce them. Complications that arise from a dice roll feel a lot more natural than complications that arise when introduced on my turn because I felt like it. It's a natural ebb and flow of any Fate, PbtA, Genesys, Cortex, Lancer, or Blades game, all of which happen to be my favorite kind of games. Forget that I use the phrase over confidence. That was a very specific instance of a larger aspect of role playing that I miss, which is dice rolls where more than one thing happens.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 03:29
|
|
|
CitizenKeen posted:That's not my play style at all. When I was running Spectaculars, my players were mildly perplexed that they would never miss. I told them, "Spider-Man almost never misses, just other bad things happen along the way. He knocks the villain over, but then the villain's rocket knocks a helicopter out of the sky and now Spider-Man has to go deal with that as well." That makes a lot more sense. I see faberge eggs and hostages and all I can think is "ugh a paladinfall game" but your second set of examples has me sold. Branching chaos instead of just opportunities to irrevocably gently caress up.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 03:35
|
|
|
1,000th reminder to the cheap seats that even in AW a GM hard move does not mean failure. Or even immediate problems.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 03:35
|
|
|
Xiahou Dun posted:1,000th reminder to the cheap seats that even in AW a GM hard move does not mean failure. Or even immediate problems. Exactly. I'm running a Legacy game right now, and my favorite 6- result is "exactly what you asked for."
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 03:57
|
|
|
The silly "quantum bears" thing always tickled me because that literally happened in a game I ran. I'd already planned on there being bears there but players kept flubbing rolls so eventually the bears had tool-use and a whole society and it owned. And the players were new to the system and they just kept going, "wait I rolled a 3 why am I succeeding". It was fun.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 05:19
|
|
|
So uh. What's going on with MtG these days? I heard that they were doing some Walking Dead promo cards, and that those cards were pretty broken (I've seen this White leader type that buffed Humans to hell and back), is there something else going on? More generally, does anyone know why this is happening? Magic is WotC's golden goose, I thought it was supposed to have things like quality control and other such things that D&D doesn't get.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 10:55
|
|
|
Every year or so they release a tie in with some other Hasbro thing. I think they've done My Little Pony and Transformers in the past. They're just fun collectors stuff, not legal in any real format (although you could play them in casual games) and they tend to have overpowered or silly abilities. For example one of the MLP ones includes the text "everypony wins the game". In more general terms MtG has an issue where the standard format (cards from the last couple of years are legal) swings from "the cards are too weak and boring so no-one buys them" to "the cards are too powerful so the game devolves into bullshit meta decks playing mirror matches so everyone stops playing". The fact that the sets have to be designed well in advance makes this a bit like steering a huge tanker - at the time you apply the input you have very little idea what the situation you're applying it to is going to look like. A couple of years ago they revamped their design process, reshuffled stuff around and brought in a bunch of pro players to do testing and power level assessment in order to try and damp down these swings. This went incredibly badly, and standard currently has more banned cards than at any point in its history (I think, Urza's block may have been worse). They also had to ban a bunch of the cards in other formats and in one case rewrite the rules so that the cards don't do what they say they do any more. In the most recent set they had to ban a card less than three weeks after the release of the set because it was so obviously grossly overpowered. No-one knows what the plans are to solve this long term because Wizards' current strategy seems to be to just not acknowledge any problems. Everything is fine, please keep buying cards.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 12:54
|
|
|
Oh, I thought the Walking Dead cards were legal this time around. And I also read that basically the età is currently dominated by the Locus of Creation or something like that. The one that let's you do silly things the more lands you play. I'm guessing this is the result of those pro players meddling
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 13:09
|
|
|
paradoxGentleman posted:Oh, I thought the Walking Dead cards were legal this time around. And I also read that basically the età is currently dominated by the Locus of Creation or something like that. The one that let's you do silly things the more lands you play. I'm guessing this is the result of those pro players meddling The Walking Dead cards are legal in Commander. This is a problem, as they are mechanically unique, quite good and were available for purchase only briefly and limited in quantity, as they were a Secret Lair release. It’s caused a lot of drama, especially after the Commander rules committee declined to ban them. A lot of folks are upset, and for fairly good reason.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 13:13
|
|
|
Ah, okay, I guess this is the controversy I heard about. So i guess the question is, if the limited quantity of those cards has been sold already, why not ban them from Commander too? That way you only upset, maybe, those few who bought them instead of everyone else who is interested in Commander. I'm sorry if there is an obvious answer I am missing.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 13:17
|
|
|
https://scryfall.com/card/a25/57/flash?utm_source=mw_MTGWiki They put quantum bears on a Magic card.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 13:19
|
|
|
Any chance it could be contractual? The terms of Hasbro's promo agreement with the WD rightsholders demands they keep the cards in circulation for a set period of time, in the hope they generate publicity by showing up at tournaments?
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 13:43
|
|
|
this job has it all! https://www.indeedjobs.com/indie-press-revolution/jobs/6ae46592e7b9329204e5 quote:You like and get along well with all sorts and kinds of people, including other gamers and geek culture types. When someone presents you with an absurd or offensive opinion at a convention, your answer is politely noncommittal. quote:You don’t have any substance abuse problems. Your drinking is specifically “downwards” of social. quote:You are able to live in a small, desert town filled with eccentrics where you have to drive 100 miles to buy groceries. This doesn’t bother you. quote:Local employment available for spouses/significant others with appropriate skill sets. These potentially include jobs in mining, farming, as a mechanic, cook, waitress, ranch hand, or bartender. Burning Man also contracts workers seasonally. quote:Salary: $9.25 to $10.00 /hour
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:04
|
|
|
alg posted:this job has it all!
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:16
|
|
|
alg posted:this job has it all! *ADA senses tingling*
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:16
|
|
|
alg posted:this job has it all! But-- but-- you get free passes to Burning Man!
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:20
|
|
|
Suddenly a lot of my misgivings about IPR are thrown into sharp focus.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:36
|
|
|
I've never heard of them, and they sound like an early SJG displaced in time and space. Spill.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:44
|
|
|
IPR are Indie Press Revolution, a distributor who bulk-supply indie RPGs to FLGSes in the US. They predate the existence of DrivethruRPG print on demand, so they were pretty big at the start of the indie RPG publishing boom that's still going on. My misgivings were largely based on me being judgy, but 'they're four Burning Man types in the middle of the desert' explains why I always found them so self-congratulatory. That said, I've asked some other publishers and IPR are way better distributors than basically anyone else, because professionalism is unheard of in our little niche industry. So chalk this one up to me being judgemental.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:53
|
|
|
Loxbourne posted:Any chance it could be contractual? The terms of Hasbro's promo agreement with the WD rightsholders demands they keep the cards in circulation for a set period of time, in the hope they generate publicity by showing up at tournaments? If it was contractual then WotC shouldn’t have signed the contract in the first place. I doubt it was contractual, though, given that there’s no “circulation” of the cards. You either bought the cards on the week they were available or you’re SOL. The cards aren’t legal in Standard, either, so they won’t be showing up at tournaments
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 14:56
|
|
|
paradoxGentleman posted:Ah, okay, I guess this is the controversy I heard about. So i guess the question is, if the limited quantity of those cards has been sold already, why not ban them from Commander too? There's not an obvious answer you're missing because this is several different issues that just happened to pile up on each other. 1)These cards are black border instead of silver border. 2)Just prior to these cards releasing, they had made a blog post to the extent of "Making premium, time limited, black bordered cards was a mistake because it makes a barrier to entry for new players who missed that time window." 3)The commander rules committee made their "These cards are legal, and honestly not that powerful, there's nothing we can do, sorry, shrug emoji" Post on a friday, Saturday was the day that Rick, the ridiculously strong 4 mana triple anthem for humans was spoiled. An auto include in basically every human deck, and they did not change their decision. 4)These cards aren't just legal in Commander. They're legal in any eternal format where commander cards are legal, meaning..... 5)Within 12 hours of the walking dead cards going live on MTGO, someone absolutely destroyed an event with a deck that had 4x copies of Rick in it. 6)For a person in the real world to make this deck that had 4x copies of Rick in it would cost them $200USD during the secret lair drop. It's less now but that's only because no one has the physical product yet so supply and demand haven't had a chance to actually compete yet. If it actually turns out to be good it's price will skyrocket once people can play legacy formats in person again. 7)The commander rules committee refused to ban these cards despite the fact that it has become very obvious both before this event and afterwards that WOTC has kept them appraised of new cards that they're printing into commander. One card was banned literally within a few minutes of it's reveal due to the fact that it would be an auto include in every Blue red deck. Before it was even out. And they've refused to make any exceptions allowing it to be used as a commander or in your 99 because "that would require us to make a special rule for it." 8)Another premium auto-include in every commander deck card was just released in commander legends and the rules committee has said that this is fine and probably not an issue but if it is an issue they will ban it (After wotc is done making money off of it probably) and perhaps most importantly 9)WOTC has been very very coy about the fact that this new "Black bordered mechanically unique cards in secret lair product" standard they've set means that they could potentially print standard or modern legal cards in a secret lair product. And have made no promises not to do so in the future.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 15:06
|
|
|
thetoughestbean posted:If it was contractual then WotC shouldn’t have signed the contract in the first place. I doubt it was contractual, though, given that there’s no “circulation” of the cards. You either bought the cards on the week they were available or you’re SOL. The cards aren’t legal in Standard, either, so they won’t be showing up at tournaments
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 15:14
|
|
|
Terrible Opinions posted:I mean they're also legal in Legacy, and at least one performed well in MTGO events. True! I just doubt that, because of their limited availability, that circulation was a factor at the contract table
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 15:20
|
|
|
What was the UR card that got banned? I haven't been following magic news.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 16:25
|
|
|
Leraika posted:What was the UR card that got banned? I haven't been following magic news.  It didn't get banned because it was good, it got banned because it was a free extra card due to the format rules.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 16:34
|
|
|
It is a shame because more otters should be op. All the best cards should be cute. Companion was a really bad mechanic that had to get an irl hotfix because of how broken it was
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 16:39
|
|
|
Toshimo posted:
Yeah. The issue is that it's not just banned as a companion (And with the nerf it's much worse, even if it is a free card), it's that it's banned In Commander Period. So you can't use it as your commander or in your deck. It's also auto-banned in WOTC's other singleton format. So it's only usable in places where there aren't enough cards to actually reward using him, and a 6 mana spell doubler you have to telegraph isn't actually that good.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 17:12
|
|
|
Companion is the only mechanic I can think of in MtG history that instantly broke every format at once
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 17:14
|
|
|
Kurieg posted:Yeah. The issue is that it's not just banned as a companion (And with the nerf it's much worse, even if it is a free card), it's that it's banned In Commander Period. So you can't use it as your commander or in your deck. It's also auto-banned in WOTC's other singleton format. So it's only usable in places where there aren't enough cards to actually reward using him, and a 6 mana spell doubler you have to telegraph isn't actually that good. Yes, this is how bans work. They don't do partial bans.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 17:19
|
|
|
Toshimo posted:Yes, this is how bans work. They don't do partial bans. It's a format they created out of whole cloth that they are also the sole arbitrators of. Creating a companion ban is as simple as saying "this card is banned as a companion"
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 17:45
|
|
|
Froghammer posted:Companion is the only mechanic I can think of in MtG history that instantly broke every format at once I haven't played Magic in years, is there a quick way to sum this up for people out of the loop?
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 18:08
|
|
|
GreenMetalSun posted:I haven't played Magic in years, is there a quick way to sum this up for people out of the loop? A Companion originally was an extra card you could include in your deck by showing your opponent before the game. They sat in a special zone rather than your deck proper so you can cast them once without needing to draw them. E: also each had a special requirement for your deck to be able to be taken this way
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 18:09
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 23, 2024 09:52 |
|
|
Kurieg posted:It's a format they created out of whole cloth that they are also the sole arbitrators of. Creating a companion ban is as simple as saying "this card is banned as a companion" Sure but it’s also a casual format generally played in small groups that can adjust stuff. I’ve got my complaints with the RC but keeping the official banned list simple for when playing with strangers seems fine to me. If you have a regular group ask them if they mind this in the 99 or as commander and they probably won’t. It’s like a lot of the more reasonable silver bordered cards.
|
|
#
?
Nov 17, 2020 19:27
|
|
