Mikan posted:

stupid gay playing against type crap

DK posted:

I care less about finding a culturally-appropriate name and more about finding a name that feels "right" for the character.

Lady Belissica is a flamboyant drag queen witch. She had to have a fancy, feminine, unusual name. She *demanded* one, actually. ^_^ Her birth name is one of those long unpronouncable Aztec names with lots of Xs.

Goro the Monkey gets a simple, short name and a nickname, fitting for a kid who grew up homeless in Nexus.

Forgotten Purity Whose Pain Must Be Known is an Abyssal. 'Nuff said.

Silent Gale is an air-aspected Immaculate who, oddly, is rather talkative. The name was given to her as a puzzle for her to solve - she hasn't, yet. ^_^

Mikan posted:

What makes it not feel like D&D to me is that it stopped trying to make sense. The designers stopped trying to maintain a self-consistent world. D&D did not succeed 100% at this (or even 50%), of course, but it always tried. Now, it doesn't even try.

It's no longer rules for another world. It's rules for a game. Instead of telling me how Iggwilv tricked Iuz or how Mordenkain built the Obsidian Citadel or how a curate can animate a skeleton to guard the abbey's crypts, the rules tell me how to push a target creature 3 squares on a battlemat.

Put another way (since we just had a philosophy/Objectivist thread...), the rules specifically tell me that there is no primacy of existence but a primacy of consciousness. That is, the reality of the game world bends depending on what the characters do. If they are in combat, the characters can teleport or blast things with lightning. Outside of combat, though they might need lightning to light a fire against a blizzard, and though they might need to teleport across the river to save their gods' idols, characters simply can't do it. What they are experiencing - combat vs. non-combat - dictates reality, rather than reality dictating what they are experiencing.

So. Yeah. It stopped feeling like D&D to me when it stopped being another world I could explore. It was never a perfect world, but it tried. Now, it's just a facade. Who wants to explore a facade?

Father Wendigo posted:

This has to be a troll, nobody in their right mind could beli-

Oh.

Fenarisk posted:

MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD MY BARD

Just give a loving unoptimized half-elf rogue with a warlord multiclass a lute if you are too poor to spend $25 bucks with a coupon for the PHB2.

Fenarisk posted:

LightWarden posted:

D&D is a class and role-based game, and it has always been a class and role-based game. I'm not sure how you can complain about it, other than the fact that the game is resisting attempts to make your character completely useless.

It's not as though he couldn't multiclass his character to get some sort of sorcerer with hand-to-hand abilities or vice versa.

I also love that none of his examples contain multi-classing that involves actual game mechanics. It's almost as though the game gives you a series of mechanics and doesn't really care about how you choose to use them.

Guildenstern posted:

How is this a grognards.txt post? Well, sure, it has the whole "LOOK AT HOW OLD I AM" attitude, but the guy's views are basically the opposite of everything that makes the other posts in this thread horrible. All he's saying is "stop arguing about the right way to do something that is supposed to be a freeform way to have fun".

Mikan posted:

I think I genuinely hate Old Geezer. I know it's silly, but I do.

Mikan posted:

I'm considering making up a magic item for Senzu Beans.

Essentially, you eat a bean and take a 5 minute break. Afterwards, you feel like you got an Extended Rest. You start with 1 Action Point, refreshed Healing Surges, refreshed Dailies.

What level magic consumable should that be?

I've been scouring Adventurer's Vault and PHB and can't find anything equivalent.

clockworkjoe posted:

what does the scouter say about his human being levels


Just a quick note. DBZ is an inherently passion driven and drama filled setting. Using a complex rule system is bound to create not only huge inconsistencies but also detract from the umph of the game. I would look at some rules-lite RPGs for examples to emulate the game. I almost used Mage (oWoD) to run a DBZ game since the magik rules can do anything (which is more of less what the characters do, almost anything).

Regarding Ki and Power level. I sugest you look into martial arts to understand the underlying concepts that created the DBZ mythos. Ki is everywhere, it flows into the person and out of the person. Martial artists concentrate on 'integrating' Ki so that it merges with their bodies and augments, heals and alters them. Sayans are an example of someone who starts out with either more initial Ki or who has a 'larger' flow of Ki going through them. That is important.

Essentially, I would have about three or four important attributes like this:
Passion(willpower and more) use it to activate powers and push personal abilities
Ki ability to control the flow and direction of Ki
Power the amount of integrated Ki, it is used as the base speed, strength, etc.

You probably want to add descriptors so players can add qualities to their character giving them a bonus if an action fits the descriptor (like strong, fast, cheerful, determined, power-hungry, etc.). From this base, I would provide players a number of options at character creation (like sayan heritage) and abilities (energy balls, superspeed, powerup, etc.) and put the whole thing in a point buy system. A similar experience system can be used to buy new abilities or augment the traits (so you can have even more powers, muhaha!).

In this way, the setting comes first, the martial arts are primary (through the abilities) and the whole thing is very dramatic since Passion is used to activate powers (just like in the show!) but Ki is the skill the player has in controling it.

Certainly, most of the work in this system would be the creation and definition of powers, requirements (like base power, passion, ki levels) and prerequisite powers. (All the work involved in this was why I thought Mage's magic system would simplify it for me in a one shot game.) If you like making lists of cool powers and organizing them, then this should be much easier for you.
__________________
Paul R. DuPont
Chronic Thinker and RPG Designer
Live life as if enchanted!

it's over 9000

Mikan posted:

Well there is an official DBZ roleplaying game through Fuzion but yes, lots of forums have people sperging out how to best to be super saiyans

Naar posted:

creepy japanese 4chan poo poo

Red_Mage posted:

I recently received a call from a friend who was all excited about the upcoming release of 4th edition Dungeons and Dragons. Since I have not gotten my hands on a rule book yet (well OK no one has except maybe some play testers) I can't talk about the quality of the game or the mechanics in the game. What I can talk about is Wizards of the Coast and their transparent attempts to empty our pockets. Don't get me wrong I do not begrudge anyone making money. I have happily spent hundreds of dollars a year on gaming supplements for most of my life, and I hope the companies I spend money on succeed because they are producing products I enjoy. What I am talking about is how WotC has started the disturbing trend of releasing a new version of D&D every three or four years.

First they released 3rd Edition in 2000. The game was flawed from the start. It was less than a month after it came out that the group I played with started making up house rules to repair its inadequacies. Three years later they released version 3.5 which "fixed" the flawed system. The worst thing is many of the things that were fixed had to have been discovered in play testing if we discovered them in less than a month of play. You will not be able to convince me they didn’t know the original 3.0 was flawed. Then they started re-printing all the books they had released to date upgraded for 3.5. This was nothing more than programmed obsolescence in my opinion. They sucked us in to 3rd edition… then "fixed" it so we would buy all the books for it twice. And now that D&D 3.5 is going strong they announce that 4th edition is on the horizon. Other than there being WAY too many books out for it to keep track of D&D 3.5 is fine as it is. There is no need of a 4th Edition, and this is just another attempt to sucker us all into buying the books we already own for a third time! They will just be revamped as 4th Edition.

I personally do not intend to spend one penny on 4th edition, and I strongly suggest everyone else do the same (or not do the same as the case may be). There are better games out there than D&D anyway, or keep playing 3rd edition if you like it. Just because WotC is releasing a new edition does not mean we should buy into it. It makes me sick to see my fellow gamer geeks taken advantage of, and I hate Wizards of the Coast for ripping us off. I gave up giving WotC money for Magic the Gathering a long time ago because I realized that it was just a trap designed to get more and more of my money. Now they are doing the same thing with D&D and I do not intend to let them take advantage of me. 4th Edition is specifically being released to make all our old stuff obsolete, and I’m not falling for it.

Once again proof Wizard’s of the Coast is Evil! The Wal-mart of the gaming Industry!

Red_Mage posted:

My gaming group tried out 4th edition - we've nicknamed it Wizardhammer 40K. I wanted to give it a chance before I made up my mind about it. So far, I see no redeeming features. The ONLY thing I liked is the setup for races. The addition of the dragonborn and tiefling give players who like monstrous characters something to pick from that you can play at first level with no crazy ECL. Outside of that - nothing. The spellcasting system castrates wizards, and the clerics' uniform abilities regardless of diety take the fun out of playing one. Plus, healing surges for all classes take away one of the major support roles for the cleric. The fighter gets screwed because you can only use things like Cleave once in an encounter, and once you've declared it, it's used whether you land the hit or not. The ritual system that allows any class to cast if they take the rituals feat also sucks because the expense and time for each of the rituals makes them useless in game. AND last but not least (for this rant anyway), the action points system in 4th edition is quite odd. In Eberron it was easy to figure out how many action points you had, and when and how they could be used. For 4th, apparently, you only really ever have one. Sure, you can get an additional action point after 2 encounters, but by then you've most likely spent the one you had before, so - you get one. You might as well just take 6 hours off in game and call it good. Eesh. I think I'm sticking with 3.5. Never ever wanna play Wizardhammer again. Ever.

CoarsestGrate posted:

...

LightWarden posted:

Odd, rules for HP of doors and things are on page 65 of the DMG. But never let being consistently wrong get in the way of a good rant.

clockworkjoe posted:

Door destroying is a proud D&D tradition

clockworkjoe posted:

I also like old-style, but I can't claim nostalgia since I didn't start gaming till I was 17 (am now 22).

What I like mostly is more of the focus on descriptions rather than mechanics.

Example:

Player: "How wide is the ledge?"
GM: "Maybe 2 inches.."
(New School) Player: *seeing the modifiers of the Balance skill for that short a span* "Oh, nevermind, I better find another way across."
(Old School) Player: "Okay ... can I press myself up against the cliff face and side-step across?"
GM: "Sure. Since you aren't pressured and can take your time, you don't even have to roll anything."
(yes, I am aware that other rules exist in the new-school that can circumvent this situation, but that's just it: they are rules, rather than descriptions)

In other words, it's more about player (and GM) creativity. I just feel much more of a sense of magic and wonder from old-school editions. ATM I'm thinking that RC D&D does just what I want old-D&D to do.

clockworkjoe posted:

When the new edition of D&D enters the game shop, gaming begins to correct itself. Let me use this example: Imagine four different editions of D&D on the edge of a gaming shop shelf. Say a direct copy of the the edition nearest the shelf is sent to the back of the line and takes the place of the first edition. The formerly first edition becomes the second, the second becomes the third, and the fourth falls into the discount bin.

Old School D&D works the same way.

clockworkjoe posted:

Then I went back to the officials office, stuck my head in and said "Stage 1" and left. (The verbal trail, the books and then updating 'em as to the status made it look like I was far more in control and had a plan than I really did. Looking like you have a plan and the officials are behind changed the normal dynamic and is what changed it from 'kid squable' to 'oh poo poo, lets fix this')

Mikan posted:

So, someone on my Friends list has a friend of theirs link to Bad Dragon in a comment. For those who don't know and don't want to click on the link, Bad Dragon apparently is a bunch of people who make draconic dildoes, complete with pornographic dragon-on-dragon artwork of the respective dildoes' flesh equivalents in use.

The first thing that goes through my mind, while looking at the site, is, "wrestling those dragons down to take penis casts must be one heckuva dangerous job. I hope those adventurers have resurrection coverage in their insurance."

And then I think, "That would be a wonderful D&D game concept."

Now I have to find some kind of group to inflict this upon. Who's up for the game, and who's going to bring the Funyuns and Mountain Dew?

- Mel

shotgunbadger posted:

Red_Mage posted:

also read his "interview" with Leeds

Whaleporn posted:

That man is truly the purest source of grognard.

Amish Ninja posted:

You show a profound ignorance of the art form.

edit: YOU SWINE.

DeclaredYuppie posted:

I was imagining him sitting in a press group, Leeds at the podium, and pundit-guy just shouting these questions while the other reporters looked at each other uncomfortably like "should we stop him?" Eventually security would show up and drag him out while he screamed "I have first amendment rights! Bush did 9/11!"

Drox posted:

I shamefully report this made me laugh. We are both bad people.

shotgunbadger posted:

I can't imagine him as an adult, really. He posted a "HAHA I WOULD SO OWN HIM" fake interview. There's no way an adult does that. Maybe he's a teenager stealing his dad's pipe or something but god drat.

Also I love the mental image of him foaming and screaming while the guy just sits there giving calm answers, I bet he imagines he's the Spider Jerusalem of the D&D reports.

Panzeh posted:

Also, same people complaining that fighters are too 'anime'.

Doing maneuvers other than full attack, action movie stuff: over the top, wuxia, anime

Flying high, throwing fireballs, teleporting: high fantasy, gritty, realistic

brennon posted:

I'm not sure if this is exactly grognard material but

GoldenDelicious posted:

The amount of unreferenced, egregious, and blatantly invented statistics among nerds is really kinda sad. I guess it comes from the whole "oh well we spend more time on the internet so we MUST know more" mentality.

Megaman's Jockstrap posted:

I know this has been adequately covered, but the odds of rolling above 10 four times consecutively on a truely random 20 sided die is about the same as cold-rolling a 20 on command.

In other words, that doesn't happen very much.