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Okua posted:Since this thread is generating so many good ideas, I want to bring up something I'm brainstorming. I'm GM'ing a fantasy 5e D&D game for 3 players, and one of them just told me on super short notice she can't join the game we had scheduled for Saturday. The result will probably be that the missing player's character spends the session in prison (she broke into a guy's house and got seen by the guards last time we played, so it works out well). The missing player is cool with that idea. The remaining PC's - two drow travellers, which are super rare to see aboveground in the setting - will then have to get her out somehow. Given that they're finally in the continent's major city instead of the mud-soaked countryside, there could be an actual legal system to interact with. the city is ruled by a council with plenty of nobles, corruption, opportunities for bureaucracy... they are approached by a noble who offers to pay the guards off to look the other way and make it easier, but that house they burgled happened to contain a relic belonging to an enemy of that noble family(i will call them house pepsi for clarity in this post) currently engaged in a cold war type situation. while it was being brought to the evidence chest , the relic - some textile that she took as part of the burglary - began to glow in the light of the full moon to reveal an ancient pepsi burial ground, showing that instead of a pointless but pretty antique, it was actually a treasure map the whole time. if the party helps them uncover an ancient pepsian seal, they would be willing to help the burglar out of jail with the best lawyer gold can buy. what would they do with an ancient seal? they dont pay you to ask questions. underneath an abandoned shop(that house coca cola randomly decided to buy after our thief friend got arrested), by digging down with sledgehammers and picks, you can find a crypt filled with spooky undead, maybe a magic item(finders keepers!) and the seal which can be traded for her freedom if the party so wishes. alternatively, the party can turn around and go to house pepsi and offer to return their seal for them for pretty much the same thing. or, they could go independently, avoid the faction war, and try to do it themselves.
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Jun 4, 2020 19:52
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Another gang is trying to break someone else out and figure you guys could help/use the help/be a distraction for their real plot. The city watch is in conflict with the city guard and neither of them are responsible for the prison system, because of atrocities of the past when they had more power to abuse. The prison bureaucracy doesn't care for either faction and is fairly incompetent and occasionally get their bookings crossed. This could mean your person is in the wrong cell or the factions start fighting and give unsuspected cover for the rescue op. Magic prisons are dope. Null fields and illusion/familiar guards.
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Jun 4, 2020 20:42
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Glory to Italia!
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Ancient pepsi burial ground is an excellent username
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Jun 4, 2020 21:56
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Hey all, just wanted to say thanks for the fantastic ideas for the magic university exam + how to manage multiple mission options. It's taken me so long to respond because they sent me down a rabbit hole of creativity, but I've finally emerged. Now have 12 missions planned out, and I'm excited to see how the players react to the options when we play tomorrow. As for the exam, I'm going the Theoretical->Practical exam route. Theoretical exam is a mean one, but that's mostly an in-joke between myself and the wizard player as we've spent the last month creating exams. I went for a range of questions about spell schools, durations, casting times and names + an essay prompt. Feel free to steal for your own purposes: https://drive.google.com/file/d/12m6YIDrQvbNgikvnyYFtfJAl8ie-6l-L/view?usp=sharing Here's what I came up with for the practical part:  A door with 4 puzzle locks behind a bubble (with occasional strategically placed cutouts). There'll be a scroll dispenser which players can use to gain one-time use scrolls for any spell within their casting ability (though using your own spells gets bonus points). Puzzle locks are: Top left: the dirt puzzle taken from this awesome suggestion pog boyfriend posted:for an initiate test: the players stand on a clear platform(which, importantly, has holes in it... like small holes meant to let air through for a glass box designed to hold an animal) beneath them is a second floor, which contains some loose earth and a sensitive pressure plate. one can use gust(push dirt), mage hand(press down on pressure plate), mold earth(guess), thaumaturgy(tremors trip pressure plate) to press it down. if one has druidcraft, they will find a seed which when druidcrafted forms a tiny little plant guy that follows instructions. do not do this puzzle if the players somehow do not have any of these cantrips Top right: simple lightning puzzle. Most straightforward single-spell lock, but I really wanted to draw tesla coils Bottom left: Player has to focus the light into the eye, which can be achieved by heating or cooling the coils so they expand or retract in order to line up the lenses. Alternatively clever use of light or similar spells could work Bottom right: Player has to get the smoke into the horizontal pipe. Sleep, animal friendship, speak with animals or other spells on the hamster is one way to do it, alternatively gust or similar spells could directly move the smoke. One final thing: if the player casts "detect magic" on the set up, they'll see that it's all a complex illusion and if they put their hand through they can just twist the door handle.
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Jun 6, 2020 01:22
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last bit is the best, I love that
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Jun 6, 2020 01:50
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Sanford posted:Anybody give me a good idea for a magic item? At the end of last session I told two of my players that they could grab a single potion from a wizard's shelf, and if they described it to me I'd tell them what it does. One took a bottle with liquid that kept changing colour and a dragon on the label. He gets a breath weapon. The other said his bottle was full of vapour that came together into the form of a man, then swirled away again. I just said "oh yes, Flannigan's Smokable Genie? Nice choice". Tonight I've got to make good on that. Any suggestions? Game is very rules-lite D&D 5e. it does more or less exactly what you'd expect a "smokable genie" to: you smoke it, you get a wish. no immediate catch. the problem here, is that it is quite literally made from ground-up genies, who are very, very nonplussed as a rule about the whole thing, and can smell it on you for weeks to months after you use it. so, if you use Smokable Genie and then run into a living genie, expect that genie to be hostile towards you at best.
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Jun 6, 2020 02:24
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Genie police habitually using "I can smell ground genie" as a pretense to get up into people's poo poo
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Jun 6, 2020 07:22
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Sanford posted:I just said "oh yes, Flannigan's Smokable Genie? Nice choice". I was immediately reminded of this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHLw2lyLnA8
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Jun 6, 2020 08:14
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I'm gonna have to walk a fine line. My players are lowlifes, thieves, thugs, and officially wanted for crimes against the (legitimately good) empire. Their personal immediate goals happen to align with the empire's (kill the Apocalypse Beast), but in addition to being wanted criminals, they're also actively ideologically opposed against it. Now we always do random rolls to see if any of the world's big movers and shakers have an interest in the situation, and that's brought up the Great Gold Wyrm, the capital-LG Lawful Good dragon that protects the empire and inspires an order of paladins. I'm thinking of working an angle where a paladin has been given the task to protect the party from demonic assassins (cause they piss off bad guys as well). Secretly he's also supposed to evaluate them - the Gold Wyrm wants a trustworthy account of whether they're truly beyond redemption. He's even prepared to plead their cause with the empire if they show some good qualities. He is that noble and good. Of course, if they're not, he's equally prepared to send everything he's got after them. I definitely want to avoid this turning into the standard "DMPC paladin sets the tone" situation, but if I can pull it off, I kinda want to riff on it a little, too. I'm thinking they'll find a valuable ally in combat with the paladin, but him hanging around makes dealing with their usual associates harder. They're free at any point to just slit his throat in an alley; obviously that will result in a very bad evaluation (plus the demonic assassin is extremely real), but it's a valid approach. But I'm not sure how to effectively communicate that without flat out suggesting they could get rid of him. (also if anyone's got a better idea on how to involve the paladins or good dragons in their dealings - currently they're about to investigage the HQ of a rival thieves gang / Apocalypse Beast cult -, ideally in a way that is neither a definite obstacle nor a flat out bonus but more of, I guess I'd say a nuisance, I'm all ears.)
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Jun 6, 2020 15:01
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My Lovely Horse posted:Genie police habitually using "I can smell ground genie" as a pretense to get up into people's poo poo A few hours after this at the Genie Police station, "You know Ebenezer, I don't think we thought this all the way through."
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Jun 6, 2020 15:29
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My Lovely Horse posted:I'm gonna have to walk a fine line. My players are lowlifes, thieves, thugs, and officially wanted for crimes against the (legitimately good) empire. Their personal immediate goals happen to align with the empire's (kill the Apocalypse Beast), but in addition to being wanted criminals, they're also actively ideologically opposed against it. Now we always do random rolls to see if any of the world's big movers and shakers have an interest in the situation, and that's brought up the Great Gold Wyrm, the capital-LG Lawful Good dragon that protects the empire and inspires an order of paladins. (screaming) play it for comedy if the paladin is funnier the group is going to be less likely to kill him. once this happens make things truly heinous that give the party opportunity to prove themselves the lighter shade of grey. i guarantee you they are going to do some bad poo poo in front of the paladin who pledges on his oath to the gold wyrm he is there to protect them and will not harm them, have the paladins reactions be as funny as you can possibly make it. then, have a moment where the party sees something genuinely horrible that they(who are anti heroes at this point judging from the post) have an opportunity to do something good. all that time you played up the paladin for comedy? its out the window. now, we see what a lawful good paladin truly is like, and it gives the party a chance to see this figure they have most likely been clowning on in a different, sympathetic light. as for how to make it not entirely a benefit, simply show that the world is in shades of grey, something it looks like this post is capable of. this paladin is great at kicking down the door and shouting justice, but when it comes to shady back alley dealings to gather information, our paladin friend is a liability. have the party show him there are other ways to get the right information, and as long as they do not get too evil, let it cause this paladin to grow to respect the party.
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Jun 6, 2020 16:06
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Do you guys have any tips or ideas when it comes to creating a world (or continent) map that we can add to as we go along? Currently the world is kinda hazy but I expect details to perculate out as the players hear rumors or flesh out their backstories. Any good software to use? I figuren it might be fun to collaborate on it. We are playing over roll 20 btw. Go with hexes, and add one after each adventure in a new spot, I suppose you could then move them around a bit if new things turn up.
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Jun 6, 2020 17:03
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Make the DMPC paladin thicker than two planks, a pretty faced vapid naive boy or girl whose eyes don't have much going on behind them. Basically a "book learning in the monestary all my life" type person who the head abbott / matron / whatever only entrusts to the care of the PCs if they swear a holy oath to look after the kind, gentle holy airhead. This way they won't (can't) upstage anyone and it'll be clear to the players it's definitely not there to bark orders at them and make them secondary characters in their own story. Also adding to the comedy suggestion above. The players may enjoy coming up with all sorts of ridiculous excuses and justifications to keep their paladin smiling & happy. DancingShade fucked around with this message at 22:38 on Jun 6, 2020 |
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Jun 6, 2020 22:35
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My Lovely Horse posted:I'm gonna have to walk a fine line. My players are lowlifes, thieves, thugs, and officially wanted for crimes against the (legitimately good) empire. Their personal immediate goals happen to align with the empire's (kill the Apocalypse Beast), but in addition to being wanted criminals, they're also actively ideologically opposed against it. Now we always do random rolls to see if any of the world's big movers and shakers have an interest in the situation, and that's brought up the Great Gold Wyrm, the capital-LG Lawful Good dragon that protects the empire and inspires an order of paladins. This might be putting a square peg in a round hole. But my first thought is the old joke about the classic Paladin and mount, where the horse is the divinely ordained one. Bob isn't much of a talker or an independent thinker. Heck sometimes he even talks to his horse before acting on the party's advice. But there is not a lot of wiggle room in his written orders: work with the players until the notorious demon assassin is taken care of. Extremely handy in any situation where another pair of hands is useful.
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Jun 7, 2020 01:45
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My Lovely Horse posted:I'm gonna have to walk a fine line. My players are lowlifes, thieves, thugs, and officially wanted for crimes against the (legitimately good) empire. Their personal immediate goals happen to align with the empire's (kill the Apocalypse Beast), but in addition to being wanted criminals, they're also actively ideologically opposed against it. Now we always do random rolls to see if any of the world's big movers and shakers have an interest in the situation, and that's brought up the Great Gold Wyrm, the capital-LG Lawful Good dragon that protects the empire and inspires an order of paladins. Why secretly? Conspire against the PCs from the other direction - the paladin is completely open about the whole of what they're there to do, but a large number of the party's underworld contacts have lined up, almost certainly not coincidentally, to demand that the party scratch their back for a change. Yes, being completely open when it's likely to get you shanked is not the best tactical move, but when your boss is stapling shut the gates of Hell with their own body you tend to be a little reckless.
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Jun 7, 2020 04:35
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Hello, first time GM here. I hope this is the right thread! I haven't actually had a session yet because I'm still planning this thing out. I've played D&D 5e for maybe four or five years now. Most of my and the party's experience is in a long-running magic heavy, sandbox-ish home brew setting (we barely hit level 12). I find the freedom to do as we please even if it means a city gets razed by orcs because we hosed off to find loot to be a great experience. It also feels good to get a bad rear end item that does crazy poo poo. My goal is to provide that experience but in a completely different setting. I really like sci-fi and thought I could share my passion through D&D with my friends. I am using multiple sources for inspiration. For setting, I'm using elements from Starcraft, Starship Troopers, Forever War, The Expanse, Star Trek, and Battlestar Galactica. I'm leaning towards "kinda hard" sci-fi so there isn't psychic stuff, teleportation, or things of that nature (but there's nanobots, lasers, and wormholes and whatnot). You can, however, easily die in space and have to deal with gravity, etc. For rules, I am using "Hyperlanes" and modifying it. I've converted about 300 spells from the 5e spell list to fit my setting, on top of the existing ones from Hyperlanes. I'm adding extra elements like customizable armor that can contain modules that perform different functions, and implants that provide stat boosts or give additional abilities. I'm also expanding on the Starship/Vehicle concept from Hyperlanes because I envision a spaceship as the home base for the party. There's basic items (like potions) as well as Superscience/artifact items that do cool poo poo, such as a Jetpack or a Spectrometer. Basically I'm converting anything that can be "plausibly" explained with future science from 5e into this universe. Holograms for illusions, nanobots for stuff like Wall of Force, etc. Since this is 5e, there is attunement and combat is fairly similar, except more range-focused than melee (but still a viable option). I was reading through this thread about how to run a sandbox campaign, which fits the "rag tag gang of space bad asses roam the galaxy fighting bad guys and chewing bubble gum" idea. I have 2 main long-term progression plots that advance whether the players do anything with it as well as 4 medium-term regional plots and 6 short-term planetary/solar system plots. So thank you for that, it was really helpful in organizing potential initial story lines. SO with all that said, my questions are: 1) Am I giving them too many options? Too many numbers? There's overlap between modules, items, and implants. Some implants can do what armor modules do which can do what some Superscience items do. I did that so players wouldn't feel locked out*...but maybe they should. I feel like there's a lot of streamlining to be done. 2) What's the best way to tackle the economy? I have no idea how to do an economy in a fair way with so much stuff available to them. I want it to be accessible but I also don't want them to have everything either. I'm trying to stay close to 5e here as much as possible. 3) Is it fair to require a special item to cast certain spells? I made up the "Didact" to allow the use of powerful spells like Fireball or Wall of Force (which wasn't in Hyperlanes). I was envisioning a quest to acquire one if someone chooses the mage class, but there's the potential issue of the party never going. I understand I can leave clues but knowing my group they could totally ignore them and gently caress off somewhere else. Would it be better to just give it to the class from the start to be safe? 4) What's the best way to incorporate a mechanic I don't want the players or 99% of NPCs to have access to? My GM said never include something that players can't achieve themselves, so that's been on my mind. Specifically, there is a race of *I do have one path that locks the player- getting biological implants slowly turns you into a new species and prevents you from using armor and weapons as you evolve further and gain new abilities. All ideas welcome! Thanks! 3 DONG HORSE fucked around with this message at 09:25 on Jun 10, 2020 |
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Jun 10, 2020 09:17
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3 DONG HORSE posted:My GM said never include something that players can't achieve themselves, so that's been on my mind. That being said: pheromones. Have your bug aliens communicate chemically. Plenty of precedence in nature for that, it gives them a very alien feel, it's functionally telepathy without the baggage, but a huge communication barrier. Maybe your players can find a way like synthesizing appropriate chemicals, or maybe you introduce additional obstacles like the alien communication chemicals having adverse effects on human physiology.
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Jun 10, 2020 09:46
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Honestly I don't like trying to balance custom creatures or NPCs against character classes. None of the critters in the books are made that way beyond CR being tied to Proficiency Modifier. Giffyglyph's Monster Maker in fact has a bunch of stuff the players cannot do, since a lot of their stuff borrows from 4th Edition D&D. The book/pdf for the tool even suggests not even giving caster npcs full on spells. Personally I do like using the existing spells, but it's a fun way to add something new... and you'd totally want to give the Wizard the opportunity to figure it out, too! For material components? Depends. If it doesn't have a cost associated with it, don't worry about it. For the things which do, tweak what is needed a little to fit your world.
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Jun 10, 2020 10:12
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"Never include any abilities the players can't use" is literally the exact opposite of good monster / NPC design. Monsters are disposable -- their resource management only matters in the encounter they're used in, they don't need to worry about XP or loot. Monsters are designed to lose most fights and generally to die, which opens up a rather large design space of on-death or "half the team is dead" triggers that would be worthless on PCs. Monsters are generally simpler than PCs because one player has to run a lot of them at once. There's a good argument to be made that there should be NO overlap between PC and monster abilities.
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Jun 10, 2020 12:57
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3 DONG HORSE posted:1) Am I giving them too many options? Too many numbers? There's overlap between modules, items, and implants. Some implants can do what armor modules do which can do what some Superscience items do. I did that so players wouldn't feel locked out*...but maybe they should. I feel like there's a lot of streamlining to be done. Spitballing, but I'd probably set up the system something like this: - you have different slots for enhancements on your body. Head, body, arms, feet, the usual D&D range. Each one broadly governs one area of enhancement. Head = willpower, mental abilities, body = AC, HP, and so on. - you can put one enhancement in a slot. - an enhancement can be a bio-implant, a magic item, a tech module... basically different categories, each of which does something subtly different within its area of enhancement. Super spitballing now but an implant could give you an all new power, a magic helmet enhance an existing ability, a tech module give a stat bonus. (This would be absolute hell to balance, by the way.) - you set thresholds for each category of enhancement. If you have more than X of one, that means further changes to your character. Someone with an implant, a magic item and a tech module is perfectly normal, someone with three implants registers as an alien to bio-scanners, someone with three magic items is basically haunted, someone with three tech modules is a cyborg. These changes may be good or bad for you, depending on your lookout and/or context. Feels like that could be its own game system right there, and in fact like that might be Shadowrun My Lovely Horse fucked around with this message at 14:57 on Jun 10, 2020 |
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Jun 10, 2020 14:42
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Can anyone recommend a Dungeon World podcast or similar? I'd like to get some sense of how it plays.
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Jun 10, 2020 14:55
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Can anyone recommend a Dungeon World podcast or similar? I'd like to get some sense of how it plays. spout lore 3 DONG HORSE posted:All ideas welcome! Thanks! in this situation my advice is not to play dnd 5e, as that is not what it is designed for. starfinder is probably going to be a much easier and less difficult thing to run, or you could play traveller or rogue legacy, or impulse drive if you like less mechanics and more chaos. if you are dead set however, 1) too many options is subjective, to some too many is impossible, others find they are unable to grasp the design space with even an above modest amount of options. ask your group where they are at. 2) for sci fi it is probably best to use "credits" and remove the coinage. economy will then be pretty much based off weapon and ship upgrades. having any semblance of a progression system that you can map to common/uncommon/rare/etc will be your saving grace. to make the numbers big convert everything into copper for credits because it is more sci fi to say a ship upgrade costs 100 thousand credits. in the future inflation is everywhere 3) its fine as long as the players can be expected to be able to get it. making a quest to get a didact sounds cool in this setting. make sure that session 0 explains all this stuff 4) just do it. your old GM was wrong, there is nothing wrong with unbalanced abilities. in a wizard vs wizard duel for example if npcs and pcs were 1:1, all other things being equal, the npcs would have an unfair advantage because they do not care about resource conservation. since you can not make npcs and pcs equal, giving npcs cool unique abilities makes things more fun. if a player asks just say a
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Jun 10, 2020 17:42
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TooMuchAbstraction posted:Can anyone recommend a Dungeon World podcast or similar? I'd like to get some sense of how it plays. Friends at the Table ran it through a very long-running podcast, if that's your bag. You can kick it off with "Autumn in Hieron".
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Jun 10, 2020 17:45
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3 DONG HORSE posted:I really like sci-fi and thought I could share my passion through D&D with my friends. I am using multiple sources for inspiration. For setting, I'm using elements from Starcraft, Starship Troopers, Forever War, The Expanse, Star Trek, and Battlestar Galactica. I'm leaning towards "kinda hard" sci-fi so there isn't psychic stuff, teleportation, or things of that nature (but there's nanobots, lasers, and wormholes and whatnot). You can, however, easily die in space and have to deal with gravity, etc. For rules, I am using "Hyperlanes" and modifying it. I've converted about 300 spells from the 5e spell list to fit my setting, on top of the existing ones from Hyperlanes. I'm adding extra elements like customizable armor that can contain modules that perform different functions, and implants that provide stat boosts or give additional abilities. I'm also expanding on the Starship/Vehicle concept from Hyperlanes because I envision a spaceship as the home base for the party. There's basic items (like potions) as well as Superscience/artifact items that do cool poo poo, such as a Jetpack or a Spectrometer. Basically I'm converting anything that can be "plausibly" explained with future science from 5e into this universe. Holograms for illusions, nanobots for stuff like Wall of Force, etc. Since this is 5e, there is attunement and combat is fairly similar, except more range-focused than melee (but still a viable option). Honestly it sounds like you should run this in a system other then D&D. If you're doing this much modification to the rules, it looks like D&D isn't what you actually want. There's a thread for asking what system you should use to run a game, that might be helpful for you.
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Jun 11, 2020 00:07
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pog boyfriend posted:spout lore i'm playing starfinder at the moment and it's fairly terrible, like I'm having a good time but it's D&D 3.5 with the lightest coat of space anti-fouling paint (so, yeah, might be what you want). Traveller is excellent, Bulldogs is Fate but has a campaign by the magnificent gareth hanrahan.
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Jun 11, 2020 00:29
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Regarding economy, it's probably better to avoid trying to balance a complicated intergalactic trading system. Just remember the motivation of cash treasure is just to give the players the choice of one big item or many smaller ones. Scale up what's available to them based on how much you reward them as you gradually increase the power level. Use the early levels to experiment with power scaling and don't be afraid to give them something you didn't intend. Keeping it simple and putting everything around "rarity" is great. Make markets somewhat localized - price fluctuations based on supply/demand/politics, supply based on geography/politics, etc. Reserve the best loot for outside the stores. ILL Machina fucked around with this message at 04:11 on Jun 11, 2020 |
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Jun 11, 2020 01:23
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Thanks for the Dungeon World recommendations! Will check them out.
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Jun 11, 2020 01:30
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Thanks for the input. You all have given me a lot to chew on and consider, so this is mighty helpful. Definitely going with the 1Cr = 1Copper idea so I can just make things inflated. I figure I can adjust payouts if the prices get too high. Also love the idea of pheromones. I'll use it as a clue so they can figure out when those creatures are talking but they'll still be telepaths. I figure I can come up with a technobabble way of communicating once they figure that out. pog boyfriend posted:in this situation my advice is not to play dnd 5e, as that is not what it is designed for. starfinder is probably going to be a much easier and less difficult thing to run, or you could play traveller or rogue legacy, or impulse drive if you like less mechanics and more chaos. if you are dead set however, Heliotrope posted:Honestly it sounds like you should run this in a system other then D&D. If you're doing this much modification to the rules, it looks like D&D isn't what you actually want. There's a thread for asking what system you should use to run a game, that might be helpful for you. sebmojo posted:i'm playing starfinder at the moment and it's fairly terrible, like I'm having a good time but it's D&D 3.5 with the lightest coat of space anti-fouling paint (so, yeah, might be what you want). Traveller is excellent, Bulldogs is Fate but has a campaign by the magnificent gareth hanrahan. Honestly? Sunk cost fallacy...so it's really hard to change tracks at this point. Also, I've done research on this subject and decided I'd have to modify any system I used. So I gravitated towards 5e since we all have experience there. Originally tried FATE with Strike for combat (the group wants numbers), but the group also didn't like FATE at all. I really like the 5e combat system, ability system, and even the spells were easy to convert into technobabble. Hyperlanes made for a great starting point, but it also kinda felt like a half-assed conversion in some places so I'm borrowing from other systems where I can fit things. I'm also really, really enjoying the homebrew aspect quite a bit. If that's stupid, then so be it. It's a fun challenge. Definitely stealing the Traveller's vehicle/starship system. It's really, really well developed. Thanks again, everyone. This is a lot of good stuff to think about.
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Jun 11, 2020 01:54
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sebmojo posted:i'm playing starfinder at the moment and it's fairly terrible, like I'm having a good time but it's D&D 3.5 with the lightest coat of space anti-fouling paint (so, yeah, might be what you want). Traveller is excellent, Bulldogs is Fate but has a campaign by the magnificent gareth hanrahan. i am not too sure on how it plays in 2020 because outside of thinking it was passable but not great in playtesting i havent looked at it at all, but when someone says "i want to run dnd, but in space," starfinder is pretty much exactly that 3 DONG HORSE posted:Honestly? Sunk cost fallacy...so it's really hard to change tracks at this point. Also, I've done research on this subject and decided I'd have to modify any system I used. yeah i have added so many homebrewed systems and modifications to games that i play that aside from if i am doing something as a job or whatever where they expect things to be by the book, its hard to say i play the game straight ... but then again, for 5e, that is sort of the point, and there is a lot worse for modification than 5e. if you are able to get it off the ground let me know because it seems like an interesting system
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Jun 11, 2020 02:16
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You're getting "maybe start from something besides 5E" for sort of 2-3 reasons. First off, D&D combat isn't great, its acceptable and what you're used to. The big thing about D&D combat is that because of how the math end of it works, there are pretty clearly superior choices about how to build a character and what to do, and in general most of the 'interesting' things are just worse mechanically. Second, D&D has a big problem with spell casters. In that outside of maybe a couple levels at the very start of the game, they're on par or flat out better than non-casters at what the non-casters can do, plus they have a very large set of options for solving any given problem. What this leads to is the caster having a lot more narrative control of the game - you run into an obstacle/puzzle, and the fastest/cleanest solution is "let the wizard throw a spell at it". Third, which sort of also contributes to the second, is that D&D is just terrible as soon as you're not dealing with combat. Non-combat puzzles, social situations, investigations, etc are all barely supported at all, and again issues with how the math works dooms them to be bad. Essentially you quickly get to a point where the options of a skill challenge are (1) anyone has a shot, and the specialist only fails on a superbly bad roll or (2) the specialist needs a decent roll to succeed, and others don't even need to try. So when you talk about hard sci-fi, there tends to be small squad combat (should work fairly ok for your 5e reskin), ship combat (you'll have to build an entire system for this, or *maybe* there are naval ship combat rules in a module you can modify), and a good amount of social/diplomacy sorts of things (d&d is terrible for this). Its not that you can't make it work, but outside of basic combat the system you're starting from is going to fight you tooth and nail to get there.
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Jun 11, 2020 03:39
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Fourth... the difference between a highly optimized character and a normal one can be very minimal outside of a few outliers (all of which are on the weak rather than strong side).
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Jun 11, 2020 05:59
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I need y'all to tell me if this is a terrible idea. Along with the magic university (with the magic exam/puzzle) I mentioned earlier, there's a gang one of the other players wants to infiltrate. For initiation I was thinking a 1:1 fight with an existing gang member. However, I'm aware that 1:1 purely martial combat in 5e is boring as gently caress. So here's what I'm thinking:
Like I said, is this a terrible idea?
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Jun 11, 2020 07:02
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How much of the overall game hinges on this guy infiltrating the gang? If it's vitally important to the story that the party has someone inside the gang, just make it a foregone conclusion that he succeeds, and have the player describe how. Or how about this: halfway through the fight the police show up and do a raid. Now the whole party can be involved in protecting the gang's business from the cops, with the PC in the initiation fight already some HP down and, if it's a fistfight, without weapons and armor. If they fight off the police (long enough to cover the gang's retreat), they'll have earned their respect and a spot in their ranks.
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Jun 11, 2020 07:25
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Sounds draggy. Maybe rock paper scissors (kick punch block) with ties being rolls?
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Jun 11, 2020 07:26
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LRADIKAL posted:(kick punch block)
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Jun 11, 2020 07:32
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Daduzi posted:I need y'all to tell me if this is a terrible idea. Along with the magic university (with the magic exam/puzzle) I mentioned earlier, there's a gang one of the other players wants to infiltrate. For initiation I was thinking a 1:1 fight with an existing gang member. However, I'm aware that 1:1 purely martial combat in 5e is boring as gently caress. So here's what I'm thinking: Most real-world initiation rites exist to do one or both of two things: they build cameraderie by having everyone suffer in the same way, and they grant the organisation blackmail material on you to stop you betraying them. So rather than have a fight, make the character do something that isn't particularly hard, but will get them in hot water if it ever comes out. Like, break into a city guard's home and steal a personal possession, something like that.
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Jun 11, 2020 08:05
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If you do want to have a duel and want to make it feel more simultaneous, you're on the right track. The cards idea is great, but don't make it so custom. An idea to keep it simple -Two attacks and two guards: Full guard: bigger block (5) Parry: light block (3), unblockable counter attack (2) Strong attack: extra damage (5) but parryable Quick attack: less damage (3) but not parryable First to 20 loses or something. Could stand to tweak this so full guard is more rewarding, like giving it a blockable 1-2 dmg counter
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Jun 11, 2020 20:13
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My first-ever GM-ing experience is almost done! We had one player drop out, which made me panic that everyone was on the verge of telling me that they weren't having fun at all. But if anything, going down to 3 players has meant more focus, more character-building, and more entertaining moments in combat. I just can't believe how well they've pulled everything together. This session, the players' plans were interrupted by the Big Bad's henchwoman, who began attacking the city of Tyr while riding upon a fire drake. They decided to lure it to the grand arena in order to draw it away from the citizens, then used a mirrored cloak which had been completely useless up to that point to blind the creature with the rays of the sun and force it to land. They fought heroically and entertainingly - the half-giant barbarian was reduced in size by a spell but successfully rolled to scramble up the drake's legs and hack at its back, and the dray ranger, on his last hitpoint, successfully rolled to leap over the henchwoman's Wall of Ice and decapitate her, before succeeding at another, incredibly tricky, animal handling attempt to calm the beast and gain control over it. We started this game with them bickering over nothing and trying to stab each other. Now it all feels...like there was an actual narrative building all along? Now they're on the back of the drake with a drunken mantis warrior and the zombified head of an ancient advisor that's been sewn onto a fresh body, flying north to gather the friends and allies they've made along the way, so they can go and beat up a psionic worm-monster. It's rad. My only real regret is failing to understand exactly how proficiency should be applied until about halfway through, and I'm not even sure they noticed.
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Jun 13, 2020 09:29
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That's some good dm energy o7
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Jun 13, 2020 11:34
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Hey GM buddies I'd like to solicit a few ideas. I'm going to try to be brief. (I failed) I'm running an adventure where a Delta Green team is sent down to Mississippi to investigate the death of essentially Stephen King, the famed horror writer Devin Sing. He was an exotic animal collector and has a saltwater crocodile, komodo dragon, king cobra, and Indian elephant, and he was found dead and partially devoured inside the croc's enclosure two weeks ago. Some years ago this writer was hit by a car and lost his ability to write. He was into the occult and learned of a creature called the "alzabo" which was a "Collector of Stories" and managed to imprison one beneath his house and forced it to write for him. The alzabo collects stories by killing people and absorbing them, but when it does this its victims actually are ecstatic because they live on within the alzabo and essentially get to spend eternity doing whatever they want limited only by their imaginations. The writer fed the alzabo on corpses he dug up from the local graveyard. One of them was the wife (Olivia) of his zookeeper (Cowie). The alzabo actually killed the writer and absorbed him, then tossed his body in with the croc to cover it up. So now both the writer and Cowie's wife Olivia live within the alzabo, and both of them are worried about what will happen to Cowie. DG was informed of something unnatural happening when Devin Sing called a Swiss bank a few days after his death to activate a series of financial transactions using an incredibly complex code phrase in what voice analysis shows is actually the writer's voice. This, of course, is the alzabo speaking with Devin's voice. When the writer died, he left behind his animals and the large swamp compound he lived on but no will. He employed Cowie, who was also his best friend to take care of the animals. The local sheriff and a local judge, being friends of both Devin and Cowie, finagled it so that the property ended up in Cowie's name so he wouldn't become homeless and someone could take care of the animals and because they knew it was what Devin would want. This means that Cowie, a beach bum from CA, became the owner of a property worth $20million. This is where the DG team comes in, trying to figure out what is going on and if there's a necromancer in the area or what. The original transaction that triggered DG's involvement was $8million, and at the end of the last session they discovered that the $8m was just the first domino in what, at that point, was a total transaction of almost a billion dollars being shunted here and there through shell companies and offshore holdings in relatively ($8m or less) quantities, making it difficult to track. I'll explain what is happening with this money in a moment. The initial plan was for the team to investigate things and each clue led on to more and more muddy water, with Cowie (who is completely innocent and knows nothing about any of this and is just trying to cope with the grief of losing his wife and best friend in a year) coming under increasing suspicion and potentially increasing pressure from DG. The alzabo is hiding in the swamp nearby, waiting to see its plans come to fruition so it can leave knowing Cowie has a reason to live. I expected a confrontation between them at some point, with the alzabo refusing to let the team harm its friend or get physical with him. But last session threw a bit of wrench into that. As part of their investigation, the team found several occult books in Devin's study, including "Professor Umbilicus's Guide to Old/New World Parabotany." This was two volumes that had extensive details on 5 plants each, with a "scratch and sniff" page at the end of each section. These "scratch and sniffs" were labelled with a pretty obvious "DON'T BECOME A VECTOR" warning: DR. ETERNUS UMBILICUS HAS NO LIABILITY IN CASE OF DEATH, TRANSFORMATION, DISPLACEMENT, CEROMORPHOSIS, VOIDHOOD, DISINTEGRATION, PHANTASMAGATION, OR ANY OTHER PHYSICAL, MENTAL, SPIRITUAL, PSYCHOLOGICAL, CHRONOLOGICAL, OR TAUTOLOGICAL HARM CAUSED BY THE USE OF THIS PRODUCT. BUYER BEWARE. Despite this, the team lead scratch and sniffed one in the presence of another agent. The leader had an oob experience where he was offered and accepted the gift of the Ur-wood Tree, which will over the course of the next year turn him into a treant. (He doesn't know this, he just knows his skin feels slightly tougher) The agent who witnessed this was suspicious, and the team lead decided in for a penny, in for a pound, and returned to the study later that night and sniffed two more. The team lead now became an incredible danger to his team. The second one he sniffed showed him that nothing awaits us after death except the Void, which gave him the choice of becoming an utter coward or suicidally brave. He picked suicidally brave. The third sniff, a plant called Thornsglory, made him a living bomb. If he is ever in actual, physical danger, huge, sharp, steel-hard thorns will blast out of his skin in all directions with the force of a claymore mine. (He doesn't know this) So now I expected that the end of the adventure was going to be the alzabo baring its teeth and then everyone getting fragged by thorns. But now the team lead's not going to make the game. So in-game, now, the team is going to wake up the next morning and the LT is just... gone. What happened to him? Where does he turn up? Does he turn up? Before he vanished I was going to use his status as something "unnatural" as a way to potentially divide and conquer when they met the alzabo, "Oh, I see I am not the only... unearthly thing here..." Now I want to use his disappearance to sow doubt, suspicion of Cowie and the locals, etc. Their commander just vanished into thin air. What was looking like a milk run with a bunch of friendlies now has a much sharper edge. How would you work the LT back into this? Last but not least, what's with the money? All my DG games end in tragedy. ALL of them. This is the first one I intend to have at least one potential happy ending. The money is being activated as part of the dream of Devin Sing: To build a world-class sanctuary and genetics lab for endangered animals. For ten years Devin Sing has been working and partnering in secret to accomplish this, and when he died he was almost finished. He and Olivia have convinced the alzabo that Cowie's story is a worthy one, and should have a happy ending. If they can make it through to the end, it just might. Holy poo poo this was ridiculous long. Sorry. I'm gonna crosspost it to GM Advice thread too. Thanks anyone who has any ideas, I always appreciate the help. BTW all this was inspired by the alzabo in Gene Wolfe's "Book of the New Sun" and Tiger King.
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Jun 13, 2020 20:18
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