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Tuxedo Catfish posted:cards are good as surfaces to put text on, as ways to privately convey information to some players but not others, as reminders that you have something or that something applies to you, and (while good shuffling is a much rarer and more difficult skill than people assume) useful for history-dependent bounded randomness where e.g. you eventually want every outcome to happen once in some period You also forgot that cards, assuming you’re not married to a standard 52-card deck, let you 1) get weird probabilities you can’t with a die (e.g. have any number X of cards value Y cards in a deck of Z if you somehow want a 37/78 chance of drawing a 7, impossible with dice), and 2) tweak your resolution mechanic in play (e.g. deck-building) so 2.5) you can have fine distinctions in probability throughout the course of play (e.g. Gloomhaven/Frosthaven’s attack modifier deck lets you slim down or add cards on level up and there’s adding bonus crit successes and failures to the deck during play as bonuses/maluses. The latter is big enough that some of the best classes in the game are focused on stuffing the monster attack deck with crit fails). Not disagreeing with you. I just think about math a lot.
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Dec 22, 2022 02:35
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Bags give you some of the advance of cards (eg finer control over the distribution of results) while being easier to randomise. They have downsides (eg component cost, speed of generating lots of results) but are still a useful tool in design.
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Dec 22, 2022 03:46
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Doctor Spaceman posted:Bags give you some of the advance of cards (eg finer control over the distribution of results) while being easier to randomise. They have downsides (eg component cost, speed of generating lots of results) but are still a useful tool in design. Yeah I was thinking of mentioning that and like the Arkham Horror LCG but then I thought I was rambling.
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Dec 22, 2022 03:51
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Roadie posted:I'm reminded of Exalted 2e Sidereals and of Scion 1e, which were both literally unplayable, not in the sense that the mechanics were unbalanced or awkward or led to undesirable outcomes, but in the sense that the mechanics literally had basic pieces missing and you couldn't actually use them as presented without first rewriting them to actually work in some way. Now that's a setting that has great lore that I'll almost certainly never play.
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Dec 22, 2022 04:02
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I love game rules like that. From an itch.io game called "Where the Sky's as Red as Honey," which is very much a game I like reading but will never play:Where the Sky's as Red as Honey posted:Draw two lines in honey on your skin in reach of your mouth. You lick a line of honey from your skin when you spend Honey [in the game]. It may also be taken from you. If you use or lose all of your Honey, you perish. If your last Honey is aiding in an attempt you are making, you may resolve the attempt before perishing. Is anyone going to use actual honey to denote Honey? Absolutely not, but it's flavorful as hell.  And then there's that bit in the rulebook of a board game set in the cold war where you determine who goes first by who was last kidnapped by the KGB or CIA. Practical, functional game rules are overrated.
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Dec 22, 2022 06:50
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Ragnar34 posted:And then there's that bit in the rulebook of a board game set in the cold war where you determine who goes first by who was last kidnapped by the KGB or CIA. Practical, functional game rules are overrated. Tiebreakers are always a good spot to have fun. Galaxy Trucker  Arboretum  Pax Pamir 2e 
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Dec 22, 2022 15:03
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I believe the latest version of Agricola suggests that in the case of a tie, everyone should play again to determine a new winner.
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Dec 23, 2022 19:07
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Sounds dangerous if all your friends are exactly as good as you at Agricola. Not a problem I'll ever have though, because the doctors tell me it's unheard of to have survived this much brain damage 
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Dec 24, 2022 00:21
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Absurd Alhazred posted:I have bad news about 90% of the professional-looking products today. True, but with easier, better digital publishing tools and platforms like itch or dtrpg it's possible to put out a product that looks good all by your lonesome. Like, World of Synnibar has an editor, proofreaders, a graphic design artist, a publisher. Someone should have been able to say, "This manuscript is hot garbage that makes my eyes slide off it like textual Teflon"
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Dec 24, 2022 01:18
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Deadlands, if I recall correctly, had each of the four suits be better at certain tasks than others so it wasn't just the Jokers that got in on the fun. And the Hucksters doing card tricks was more due to Hoyle being one of the first to put out a grimore recently, just instead of it being written in backwards Latin through a key cypher it was laid out according to, you know, poker. It was also a game where not only was Lincoln running around as an undead avenger but the only real way to succeed was through direct community action and bettering the lives of people so there was less fear around for the big bads to feed on. And leaned *hard* on having cowboys actually being primarily POC like they were in the real world. (It also had Sasquatch. And an open invitation in the opening from Bruce Campbell to play a game of it with you.) And Scion... I really like Scion but it falls apart once you hit Demi-God. Plus, as I've complained about in this thread before, the Central American pantheon is yet again the designated bad guys. Glad they fixed that in 2.0. citybeatnik fucked around with this message at 02:09 on Dec 24, 2022 |
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Dec 24, 2022 02:06
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Wasn't the original version of Deadlands pretty  ?It was also incredibly railroad-y from what I heard. Not just in adventure supplements, but in the core rulebooks where they told the GM to use unkillable NPCs to force the players into doing what they wanted. I know that Savage Deadlands cleaned that poo poo up.
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Dec 24, 2022 02:44
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SirPhoebos posted:Wasn't the original version of Deadlands pretty In order to make America/the west even more chaotic, the game had the Confederacy win the Civil War. The problem is, they didn't really do a lot to address it. Abolition still happened and the game said that most characters you meet won't be racist...that racism was a characteriatic of evil characters.
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Dec 24, 2022 03:01
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The current edition of deadlands just retcons the confederate states out. They lost the civil war, done. Time travel shenanigans. That said, no, old school deadlands was very explicit that sexism and racism weren’t part of the lore. Gatling revolver doesn’t care about the color or gender of the finger pulling the trigger, so why should anybody else?
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Dec 24, 2022 03:51
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I thought it was less "the South won" and more "Lincoln turned into a Harrowed, Jefferson Davis got eaten and replaced by a doppleganger hellbent on causing as much pain and suffering as possible leading to a stalemate, the dead are walking, rear end in a top hat railroad barons are starting up conflict, and most of California sank into the sea". I'll admit to some nostalgia/foggy memories so I could be wrong (i do recall the Louisiana rail line using literal zombies and other unfortunate tropes), and it does romanticize the whole manifest destiny thing. The writers just, to my recollection, went with "when you have jackalopes killing folks off on the frontier ethnicity becones less important".
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Dec 24, 2022 03:51
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SirPhoebos posted:Wasn't the original version of Deadlands pretty Classic Deadlands was the ultimate example of an unfolding metaplot the PCs could influence and even the GM didn’t know. Some adventurers called out that this NPC or that couldn’t die as they were important to the upcoming story in ways they couldn’t tell you about. The Civil War broke down to a frozen conflict, a Cold War that lasted until the 2070s when WWIII occurred with Ghost Rock nukes. Though things had thawed enough in the 1940s for the two nations to team up to fight together against the Axis in WWII. Hell on Earth had nothing to say about the difference between Northern and Southern characters outside of some notes in the US and CS firearms… the former are more advanced, the latter don’t have as many bells and whistles as they feel they’re better shots. Now, literally, a wizard did it and the Confederacy lost some time before the current Weird West year, but later than in real history.
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Dec 24, 2022 06:01
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Ragnar34 posted:And then there's that bit in the rulebook of a board game set in the cold war where you determine who goes first by who was last kidnapped by the KGB or CIA. Practical, functional game rules are overrated. The Fate of the Nostromo determines who goes first by whoever most recently had a cat hiss at them. Failing that, the play order is oldest player to youngest. Conveniently enough we were sitting so that turn order was this one guy and then counterclockwise.
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Dec 24, 2022 07:41
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Ragnar34 posted:And then there's that bit in the rulebook of a board game set in the cold war where you determine who goes first by who was last kidnapped by the KGB or CIA. Practical, functional game rules are overrated. I had a boss who was kidnapped by Russians picking up a ship. They faked being his airport pickup. He managed to talk them into taking him to the ship to have a ransom paid. The security detail at the vessel told them to gently caress off once they gave him up. He attributed his ability to convince them to take him to the ship to a tin of altoids. I was once cornered by Russian mafia in Busan . I’d just bought a leather jacket and they mistook me leaving the store wearing it for a competing gang. I got backed into a corner and they swore at me loudly in Russian. Quickly they realized I didn’t speak Russian. We agreed that G.W Bush was terrible. They let me go and gave me a hat (a leather flat cap). I guess what I’m saying is that I should get to go first. Bar Ran Dun fucked around with this message at 08:05 on Dec 24, 2022 |
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Dec 24, 2022 08:02
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Was it a nice hat?
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Dec 24, 2022 08:12
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I've hung out with a lot of russian mobsters, socially not for crimes. They were pretty chill, tbh. They loved Cataan. Bizarre, but I guess if you've got twenty grand in five currencies stashed in your mattress you don't need to antagonize randoms. They'd basically ask my now-wife if I was good and then just be chill and offer loads of free drinks over board games. God bless the russian mob. e: also chess and the ASOIAF board game were loving big. Edgar Allen Ho fucked around with this message at 08:30 on Dec 24, 2022 |
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Dec 24, 2022 08:25
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Russian mafia stories? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=paG1-lPtIXA
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Dec 24, 2022 09:49
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:I've hung out with a lot of russian mobsters, socially not for crimes. 
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Dec 24, 2022 18:51
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Xiahou Dun posted:Was it a nice hat? It was an okay hat. Leather but pretty thin. I gave it to a friend when I got back to the states.
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Dec 25, 2022 02:59
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TheCenturion posted:Wonders if he’d have to use Buttery Wholesomeness, or the insert of Freebase. To this day Freebase has the best version of the 3x3 alignment grid LG [Liberal Granola]: Knows that mass social protest is the only way to defeat THE MAN. LN [Liberal Noncommittal]: Buys bumper-stickers against THE MAN on occasion, and would like to rise up against his oppressors and end this cruel reign of tyranny, but prefers Dead shows. LE [Liberal Establishment]: Sells bumper-sticks against THE MAN and T-shirts for Dead shows; pretending to be part of the movement for social change, yet profiteering off his fellow brothers and sisters, finally becoming part of the System that has forced our children to go to die in 'Nam. NG [Noncommittal Granola]: Bought a couple of shirts, thinking this helps, but only practices Iron Butterfly riffs in the garage while the gears of government run by fascist weapon industries crush his remaining freedom. TN [True Noncommittal]: Is happy to live in whatever Orwellian hell is presented to him, unknowingly disposing of his own, and hence others, right of choice. NE [Noncommittal Establishment]: Buys into the propaganda machine of his mom's Rosie the Riveter days, and does not question the Draft, though it will mean his end. CG [Conservative Granola]: Blindly puts faith in other's power to change the world he is increasingly shackled by. CN [Conservative Noncommittal]: Voted for Tricky Dick because he liked his speaking voice. CE [Conservative Establishment]: THE MAN.
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Dec 31, 2022 05:37
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whydirt posted:To this day Freebase has the best version of the 3x3 alignment grid So, if I'm understanding this right, nowadays a Conservative Granola believes in QAnon and Pizzagate
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Dec 31, 2022 07:43
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Fuschia tude posted:So, if I'm understanding this right, nowadays a Conservative Granola believes in QAnon and Pizzagate They're not kidding calling QAnon 'slacktivism for fascists'.
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Dec 31, 2022 12:09
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This is a big thread and the only one I've really read on tabletop games, was there some game or setting that took place in the cthulhu mythos after humans were extinct and the surviving factions were predictably horrible? I've tried ctrl+fing lovecraft but I haven't found it
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Jan 26, 2023 01:18
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Milo and POTUS posted:This is a big thread and the only one I've really read on tabletop games, was there some game or setting that took place in the cthulhu mythos after humans were extinct and the surviving factions were predictably horrible? I've tried ctrl+fing lovecraft but I haven't found it Try Numenera. There's some Lovecraftian module books for it.
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Jan 26, 2023 01:29
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Closest that comes to mind off the top of my head is CthulhuTech.
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Jan 26, 2023 01:46
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TheCenturion posted:Closest that comes to mind off the top of my head is CthulhuTech. Cthulhutech is weird because it has a few legitimately good parts* despite what some forum goers say. Which are unfortunately surrounded by a not insignificant number of other parts that are just creepy and unpleasant to read about in a rapey and just downright disgusting "not fit for play or really anything" sort of way. Hard to recommend without the table being ready to excise the creep-bait parts. Those old reviews about bad RPG's like FATAL on here went into the awful parts of it years ago, if you can dig up the thread. Also, there was the darkly hilarious gently caress up of Shub's eldritch forest children supposedly being inhuman beauties that do...Well, creepy poo poo that is hosed up on multiple levels** to people they seduce. Except the artist for the images for that book apparently had a thing for furries and well, something didn't get quite through between the writer's intent to showcase eldritch horror that is invasive to the body and the artist's fetishes and so now a whole major adventure is some borderline WH40K-esque parody meme about purging eldritch furries that can chestburster you like some sort of macabre sexualized version of the Happy Tree Friends if they were in lovecraft. * Like the amusing "and then what?" realization that most writers in other settings can never get past where humanity realizes lovecraftian forces exist, have their obligatory mind bending freak out, and then calm down and shrug*** since eldritch horrors existing also means that gently caress yeah magic must be real and there's potential to exploit a new resource there. Large portions of the opportunistic parts of humanity then promptly begin arming themselves with lovecraftian powers to slaughter the less godlike lovecraftian horrors, colonize their niche, and steal their poo poo whenever possible in true dystopian capitalistic fashion. ** Shub is Lovecraft's racist take on a god of fertility to give an idea of where the scenario goes if you roll poorly. Cthulhutech do be like that without the players and DM going through to moderate things, unfortunately.  *** Note that calming down may be optional. There's a reason why Cthulhutech implies in several places that therapy is a lucrative career in the setting, since there's so much of a need for it. Archonex fucked around with this message at 02:58 on Jan 26, 2023 |
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Jan 26, 2023 02:08
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Archonex posted:Cthulhutech is weird because it has a few legitimately good parts* despite what some forum goers say. Which are unfortunately surrounded by a not insignificant number of other parts that are just creepy and unpleasant to read about in a rapey and just downright disgusting "not fit for play or really anything" sort of way. Hard to recommend without the table being ready to excise the creep-bait parts. Those old reviews about bad RPG's like FATAL on here went into the awful parts of it years ago, if you can dig up the thread. I admit humanity just rolling with the Lovecraft stuff and trying to adapt is one of the things I did enjoy about the setting in the middle of all the horrible stuff (well, that and I loved the basic idea of smacking horrors beyond the stars with mecha/Evas with the serial numbers filed off/off-brand Guyvers), particularly, like you mentioned, how they just did therapy to deal with all the SAN loss to scientists and such messing with the Things Man Was Not Meant to Know But Decided to Exploit Anyway. I swear there was a good idea somewhere in there to start for the game, it's just that we got... THAT instead  .
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Jan 26, 2023 03:35
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Milo and POTUS posted:This is a big thread and the only one I've really read on tabletop games, was there some game or setting that took place in the cthulhu mythos after humans were extinct and the surviving factions were predictably horrible? I've tried ctrl+fing lovecraft but I haven't found it You might like A Colder War, though it still features humans. But it all goes horrible for everyone involved!
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Jan 26, 2023 04:00
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There is also John Langan's the Shallows a short story about the last human left on earth after the stars were right.
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Jan 26, 2023 04:08
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Not a game bit Charles Stross' the Laundry Files novels take the view of a British 'civil servant' who is slowly initiated into the reality of the Things Beyond the Stars and the response of various governmental organizations. The novels do progress the setting with end times rapidly approaching and Eldritch horror becoming more and more ubiquitous. That said I haven't read any for a few years and not sure if he's stopped writing or if the quality has noise dived.
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Jan 26, 2023 17:01
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I seem to recall that CthulhuTech was very explicit that therapy was a requirement of military service, and avoiding counselling sessions would trigger 'is this person now a corrupted cultist' review. The game is just a giant love letter to 80s and 90s anime, and by the way, Cthulhu. The Laundry Files novels are great, but I kind of get the feeling Stross is burning out on them. Each novel is more or less a deconstruction of some literary genre, and I think he's done all of the genres he has a problem with. There is an RPG version. TheCenturion fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Jan 26, 2023 |
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Jan 26, 2023 17:12
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MrNemo posted:Not a game bit Charles Stross' the Laundry Files novels take the view of a British 'civil servant' who is slowly initiated into the reality of the Things Beyond the Stars and the response of various governmental organizations. The novels do progress the setting with end times rapidly approaching and Eldritch horror becoming more and more ubiquitous. That said I haven't read any for a few years and not sure if he's stopped writing or if the quality has noise dived. Stross did decide (or clarify, I'm not entirely sure) that CASE OH gently caress IT'S GREEN is a spectrum, a timeline or something, not one grand event, which the earlier stories kind of imply. It's also a game now.
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Jan 26, 2023 17:18
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MrNemo posted:Not a game bit Charles Stross' the Laundry Files novels take the view of a British 'civil servant' who is slowly initiated into the reality of the Things Beyond the Stars and the response of various governmental organizations. The novels do progress the setting with end times rapidly approaching and Eldritch horror becoming more and more ubiquitous. That said I haven't read any for a few years and not sure if he's stopped writing or if the quality has noise dived. O no, he's still writing them. The writing has kind of shifted focus as it chugged into more of a pseudo-series with a variety of view-point characters, not just Bob, but I'm still reading and enjoying them. And uh yeah, that apocalypse : The UK is literally being run by an avatar of Nyarlethotep that got """"""elected""""""" Prime Minister and who runs it as basically a black-magic authoritarian capitalistic theocracy. There are pyramids of severed heads in Piccadilly and anyone who doesn't worship the Dark Lord in the Black Pyramid gets executed via brain-vampirism. The UK is also explicitly doing significantly better than most other countries as far as CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN is going. At least the PM wants the British to mostly remain alive, human people with souls, unlike any of the things fighting for dominance in the USA. They're expressly just niche political satire now.
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Jan 26, 2023 17:20
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Yeah, NGL, they used to be instant reads for me, but I've not yet read Quantum of Nightmares or Escape from Yokai Land. They started to go off the rails for me around Annihilation Score, and really around whichever one introduced the Elves-But-Not-Like-In-Lord-Of-The-Rings.
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Jan 26, 2023 18:18
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O that one rules. They blow up Leeds.
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Jan 26, 2023 18:24
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There's been such a deluge of Lovecraft stuff in the past 15 years ranging from masterpieces to forgettable shovelware, that it could be a lot of things. It feels like there were three dozen people waiting for the precise moment Lovecraft's stories became public domain to hit that button and launch that Kickstarter. Anyway, maybe you're thinking of Degenesis?
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Jan 26, 2023 19:09
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Is it Root?
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Jan 26, 2023 20:49
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