Ilor posted:

Good. Play to find out.

sebmojo posted:

Dameius posted:

Appalachia needs Hillbilly Sappers. Or really just Hillbilly [noun].

Railing Kill posted:

Due to a job with a second shift schedule, I haven't had reliable time with anyone in my regular group for about a year. I just got a new job, though, so I'm getting back on the horse with a new game. Still, a bunch of my players have little kids, long commutes home from work, or live far away, so I'm running the game online. I've had success running Pathfinder, D&D5e, and Edge of the Empire on Roll20, but I'm thinking something different this time. Because I'm going to be running something much less tactical than D&D, I figured Roll20 might be overkill. I was thinking of running the game just over Google Hangouts, but I want to think aloud here to see if that's a good idea. 7th Sea, the game I'm running, is more narrative than tactical, so I won't need a top-down grid 99% of the time. I'm just thinking about other stuff that Roll20 brings to the table, and if it's worth using for this game:

Pro: I'm able to "whisper" to individual players in Roll20's chat, if I need to hand out secret info to one player. GH can't do this, but I can do the same thing using regular text messages. Doing that is only slightly more annoying than using Roll20.

Pro: Roll20 has built-in die rollers and other tools. I trust all of these players to roll on their own at home and accurately report results, so I don't need a die roller app, but it is still kind of handy.

Pro: Roll20 does have map support, if I decide I need it. I can easily draw and share static maps on Google's screen share, but tactical stuff will be much easier on Roll20. 7th Sea doesn't care much about that kind of stuff, though, as much as it cares about flavor and back-end decisions you make with dice and abilities. Specifically where you are on a battlefield matters less than it does in a game of D&D.

Con: A couple of my players have been having a hard time using Roll20. One of them doesn't have a proper computer and uses his phone to pipe in. Another has a netbook which apparently hates Roll20. They're willing to slog through it, but I think using GH might be a lot easier on them.

Con: Roll20 would be one more thing to have running during game, since their voice chat is terrible and we'd have to use GH alongside it anyway.

I may be missing some pros and cons, so if there's anything I should be considering let me know. Otherwise, my choice is about dealing with the nuisance of Roll20 for the sake of some of its bells and whistles, or just trimming the fat and running the game using GH for voice and screen sharing. Thoughts?

Frush posted:

Here's an interesting challenge to wrap your head around;

We're doing a campaign in the Forgotten Realms setting, where the players will start off in the Fugue Plane, albeit briefly. I've got a couple combat encounters lined up for their short stay there (foil a demon raid on the Wall of the Faithless, stop a devil from convincing souls to go to the nine hells with him, etc) but I'd like to have some kind of skill challenge. I'm having trouble coming up with something for that though, given the place is described as bland at best, doesn't really have any remarkable features, and doesn't really function like a normal city.

It'll be fine the way I have it set up, but it just feels a little combat-heavy for an intro session.

sleepy.eyes posted:

What level are they? If they're tough enough to mess with some big boys you could have them help undo/uncover some sort of plot with agents of the Far Realm stealing souls/messing with the cycle for reasons of their own.

Harrow posted:

Is there a way to play music through Discord? My group is cool with just voice chat and not video chat, but I'm about to start running my first online campaign and I gotta have my soundtrack.

Phi230 posted:

There are bots that you can invite to your server that will play the audio of youtube videos. That's what we use. You could also link a spotify playlist but everybody has to listen independently.

Paramemetic posted:

If you want something to be somewhere else, move it somewhere else. Even if you've already told them what the meanings of the cards is and where they should go as a result, you can "serialize" that: they get to the Abbey and thugs recently stole the Symbol, or they got to the pool and it was recently run dry and taken somewhere, or so on.

I have been a player once on a CoS table and it was a lot of fun, but I know that there is a ton in the book that I missed out on, it really needs replayed a few times to experience everything. Also, unlike the other pre-written modules, it is really well written. So there's absolutely zero shame or harm in doing a twist like that. Never ever let a pre-written book supersede your judgment as the DM in providing fun for your players.

You didn't stack the deck and you got an experience that you think will be less fun. Your players don't have all the information you do. They will just play it out and to them it will be what it is and they will think that's how it is and will not know "oh, there might have been a more fun option if we went to [a place we don't know about actually because it's not relevant]." So it's your responsibility, if you think they are missing out, to make sure they're not. You're not a slave to the book, you're smarter than the book, you know your table better than the book, so my suggestion is to use the book, the encounter math, all that stuff, but feel free to plug in other bits or change things up. Just make sure you keep track of that in case of later references.

Also, remember that Ravenloft / the Demiplane of Dread is ruled by the Dark Powers, so if the Tarokka reading wasn't perfect and poo poo comes up that makes it more complicated / a comedy of errors that is like 100% thematic.

Josef bugman posted:

Okay so, me and another DM are going to be running our friends through dragon heist when it comes out. We are both going to be choosing different "runs" and statting up different characters for each.

Because of this I have found out that everyone has decided to run evil characters in my version and good characters in the other DM's version. I am going to have to manage an evil party consisting of: "Sauron, but in the Silmarillion where he's just fallen in with Melkhior. Dragonborn nun who burned down her monastery. Orcish anti-paladin and a tiefling witcher."

I know it is going to be a while before the game comes out, but I wondered if integrating aspects of things like Blades in the Dark might make a good fit for the campaign?

Ignite Memories posted:

Ignite Memories posted:

Torchlighter posted:

One of the ghosts/skeletons was a renowned chef, and he demands that his one-of-a-kind, brand new (for the time) dish be served at the table. Not a problem, barring the small wrinkle: Either the recipe has been lost to time or One of the ingredients. They'll have to puzzle out the ingredients/dish from the half-remembered scraps from the chef ghost, the records of the library (which, for added convolution, describe what the dish can't be, as they record his previous recipes) and maybe some rumours from other guests who talked with the chef and remember him describing some of it. Maybe a thief looking to steal the recipe for himself.

Ignite Memories posted:

There would be spooky spiders and skeletons to fight, and eventually they would come across a massive dining table surrounded by bones. Here they would find some undead that still have the wits to speak, and they would learn about the massacre that took place - two armies met for what was to be a spectacular feast to celebrate their victory over a common foe, and everyone was fatally poisoned. (revenge from another common enemy? distrust of each other? idk)

Torchlighter posted:

One of the ghosts/skeletons was a renowned chef, and he demands that his one-of-a-kind, brand new (for the time) dish be served at the table. Not a problem, barring the small wrinkle: Either the recipe has been lost to time or One of the ingredients. They'll have to puzzle out the ingredients/dish from the half-remembered scraps from the chef ghost, the records of the library (which, for added convolution, describe what the dish can't be, as they record his previous recipes) and maybe some rumours from other guests who talked with the chef and remember him describing some of it. Maybe a thief looking to steal the recipe for himself.

Torchlighter posted:

One of the ghosts/skeletons was a renowned chef, and he demands that his one-of-a-kind, brand new (for the time) dish be served at the table. Not a problem, barring the small wrinkle: Either the recipe has been lost to time or One of the ingredients. They'll have to puzzle out the ingredients/dish from the half-remembered scraps from the chef ghost, the records of the library (which, for added convolution, describe what the dish can't be, as they record his previous recipes) and maybe some rumours from other guests who talked with the chef and remember him describing some of it. Maybe a thief looking to steal the recipe for himself.

AceClown posted:

If the reason they're taking the job is because their reputation is in the shitter then I'd do it the following way.

Let them know that there is a really prestigious cooking competition coming up in a few months but make it clear that at the moment they've got no chance to even place unless they can "somehow" blow everyone away.

The reward for pleasing the undead guests would be either a long forgotten recipe that everyone remembers or a small stash of now extinct herbs and spices, which would probably be enough to place them well in the competition.