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Wait, doesn't the book actually give blurbs on previous civilizations? Like one was all about the nanotach, one was all about moving around stellar objects, one was part of some grand galactic empire, etc etc. Like, I get that people don't like this system, but it's really starting to seem like people just didn't read the book and are complaining to complain.
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Nov 22, 2013 23:17
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Gantolandon posted:That's the approach I don't like in RPGs, though - the authors just throwing random curiosities and expecting the GM to make them work somehow in their campaign. Usually thinking up something weird is the easiest part of writing an adventure - it's integrating it with the rest of the campaign that makes it harder. I would prefer more "This building was an ancient engine factory, which worked this way, think how can you use it" and less "This building's walls create purple sparkles when touched with organic matter, think what could it do". Fair enough. Personally, I'd prefer a thing where it describes the walls, and then several options for what the walls could be (as I did with the canyon, but more in depth), and encourages the GM to run with one of them or come up with their own explanation. I like that if players come up with a hilarious/fun/cool explanation for something, that the GM can pick it up and run with it as the actual explanation, instead of just being told that no, this was an old widget production facility. I do get the desire for more concreteness. For me, the whole idea of making poo poo up on the fly like this is a novelty; my group primarily played D&D, and we were chafing against how rigid that system is. It's a breath of fresh air to us, and I like the setting, although I'm not a big fan of just how good Nanos are compared to everyone else.
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Nov 23, 2013 02:27
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One final bump for my Numenera PbP; we only have three players and I'd love a few more.
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Dec 7, 2013 08:18
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KillerQueen posted:Wait, doesn't the book actually give blurbs on previous civilizations? Like one was all about the nanotach, one was all about moving around stellar objects, one was part of some grand galactic empire, etc etc. Like, I get that people don't like this system, but it's really starting to seem like people just didn't read the book and are complaining to complain. Unless there's something I missed, there's a really vague handful of bullet points, but not much to really work with. Looking at it now, almost all of the notes say "At least one culture ________" which indicates that, say, maybe two cultures used nanomachines, or maybe all of them. I get they're trying to keep things mysterious, but saying "some of the lost cultures used nanotech and explored other dimensions" doesn't really set my mind on fire with campaign hooks or anything, especially when so much of the game's mechanics are mired in the same old "fighter hits stuff, wizard does everything else" sludge I was hoping the game would avoid through its setting. There's no reason glaives shouldn't be able to do cool things through their bodymods and enhancements. Hopefully some of the upcoming materials smooth out some of the roughness, but I'm not champing at the bit to slam money on the counter until I know for certain that's the case. Feel free to disregard if you want to assume I'm complaining to complain and trying to discredit the game. I backed it, my name's in the back of the book, I got friends onboard and I wanted it to be something cool. I think I'm justified in pointing out what I see as some pretty big letdowns.
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Dec 7, 2013 09:07
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I agree; I feel like the most I would get out of the book was adventure seeds. Interesting but very, very expensive adventure seeds. Numenera is a gimmick setting -- it's about weird-rear end loot in weird-rear end-loot world -- so it needs a gimmick rule set. The more I think about it the more I believe that, if you toned down the goofy, Numenera was meant to be run in Gamma World.
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Dec 12, 2013 08:55
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If I ever really wanted to run Numenera I'd either use One Roll Engine / Wild Talents and let players come up with their own powers or run it in Paranoia, depending on what tone I wanted the game to have. Either majestic scifi adventure or wacky scifi hijinx about trying out poorly labelled
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Dec 13, 2013 23:58
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Reading the Numenera F&F review, my initial impression was that if you wanted D&D-style adventures in a crazy futurepocalypse to just use the latest edition of Gamma World.
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Dec 14, 2013 01:45
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http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=9315 Here's a decent review of it that I think labels the strengths and weaknesses of the game pretty well. This is really a game that relies on a good GM more than anything, as the player's choices are a little too simplified for their own good.
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Jan 20, 2014 20:37
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Seeing as the chief editor is writer of erotic fiction, it was only going to be a matter of time before this existed.
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Jan 25, 2014 19:29
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CottonWolf posted:Seeing as the chief editor is writer of erotic fiction, it was only going to be a matter of time before this existed. Roll d20 to determine how many uses your 8th World vibrator has left. But seriously, dunno the point of this. Shouldn't these things have just been included in the Guide to the World of Numenera or whatever that they have coming out in a few months? I doubt this'll sell very well on its own.
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Jan 25, 2014 19:39
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SunAndSpring posted:Roll d20 to determine how many uses your 8th World vibrator has left. I'm not sure it would fit there, I thought that was more about locations than culture. But yeah, it's an odd thing however you look at it.
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Jan 25, 2014 19:48
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SunAndSpring posted:http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=9315 This actually is a pretty fair review even if the perspective this guy has is very dissimilar to mine. CottonWolf posted:Seeing as the chief editor is writer of erotic fiction, it was only going to be a matter of time before this existed. Monte Cook can breathe easily knowing that his game has now well and truly made it to the big leagues.
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Jan 25, 2014 21:09
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CottonWolf posted:I'm not sure it would fit there, I thought that was more about locations than culture. But yeah, it's an odd thing however you look at it. I think the strange part isn't that this book got published, but that it got published so very soon after the corebook's release. It makes me wonder how many people actually purchased/used the Book of Erotic Fantasy in their 3E games. Then again, the Nibovian Wife in the Numenera corebook is  enough that vibrator cyphers don't seem like that outlandish a jump.
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Jan 26, 2014 21:50
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Finally, I may put all these Friction-reducing gels to use. I hope the bestiary comes out soon  , I actually kind of like a lot of the creatures in the core book.
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Jan 26, 2014 23:53
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Arrrthritis posted:Finally, I may put all these Friction-reducing gels to use. Should be out by the end of January. They've got a preview of it on the site. http://www.numenera.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/Ninth-World-Bestiary-Preview-2014-01-13.pdf Let me say that Vapes are a rad idea. SunAndSpring fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Jan 27, 2014 |
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Jan 27, 2014 00:06
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QuantumNinja posted:Then again, the Nibovian Wife in the Numenera corebook is Oh right I bought the pdfs a while ago. I should look that up. ... ... ... 
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Jan 27, 2014 00:10
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Sleep of Bronze posted:Oh right I bought the pdfs a while ago. I should look that up. Succubi are the worst bait-and-switch ever. Like, their existence makes me distrust every female NPC in a bar ever, because the DM might just go, "TURNS OUT SHE'S A SUCCUBUS, ROLL INITIATIVE. DON'T FORGET YOU ARE NAKED BECAUSE YOU WERE TRYING TO BONE HER TWO MINUTES AGO, SO THAT MEANS NO ARMOR" if you try to hit on the barmaid.
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Jan 27, 2014 00:19
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Sleep of Bronze posted:Oh right I bought the pdfs a while ago. I should look that up. quote:These biological constructs appear to be beautiful female humans. Their only function, however, is to seduce male humans so they can get pregnant. Pregnancy in a Nibovian wife opens a transdimensional rift inside its womb, giving an ultraterrestrial (such as an abykos, an erynth grask or any ultraterrestrial creature the GM wishes) access to this level of existence. The time required for “gestation,” which is actually the aligning of phase changes to create the rift, ranges from ten minutes to nine months. When the ultraterrestrial creature is “born,” the Nibovian wife nurtures it as if it were a child, even though it clearly is not. During this time, the construct defends the “child” fiercely, using incredible strength and resilience. The young creature develops quickly, and its first and only compulsion is to hunt down and kill its “father.” Once it does so, it is free to do as it pleases in the world. Nibovian wives are likely the cause of many ultraterrestrials currently in the Ninth World. Stolen seed lets a monster enter the world. Ho Hum.  (In recent fiction that was a huge part of one of the Malazan storylines (minus the extradimensional monster/ robot mother part), completely aside from the age-old succubus stuff. )Dump the "must kill the father" part and you have room for some much longer and more complicated stories. edit: Further googling has led me into a brand-new chapter in the RPG gender war. Ugh. No one has these arguments about how Alien facehuggers are implying all pregnancy is rape, but somehow succubi imply all women are baby-seeking-monsters.
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Jan 27, 2014 00:38
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Even "must kill the father" can be worked with depending on what kind of ultraterrestrial it is and how they go about doing the killing.
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Jan 27, 2014 23:15
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I just grabbed a copy. From the initial flip-through it looks like a good book/setting if you like to write/plan games and your players like narrative/story styles of play. edit: Still flipping through it. Seems like a decent way to mashup (early) DnD and Rifts. FRINGE fucked around with this message at 14:14 on Jan 28, 2014 |
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Jan 28, 2014 14:01
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Edge is really the system's saving grace IMO.
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Jan 28, 2014 15:11
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It looks like the bestiary has just gone up for sale on drivethrurpg. Haven't purchased it, but I imagine some people here might be interested in it. Judging from the previews someone posted earlier, it looks like it has some interesting monsters.
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Jan 30, 2014 00:52
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It's free RPG day, and you can pick up the corebook a ridiculously cheap $9.99 today. On a different note, last night I ran a short amount of Beale of Boregal, and my players decided to add their own touch to the Numenera logo I whipped up: 
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Apr 5, 2014 22:29
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So, are any of those supplements that aren't from Monte Cook Games any good? This game could really use some more character options.
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Apr 5, 2014 23:06
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SunAndSpring posted:So, are any of those supplements that aren't from Monte Cook Games any good? This game could really use some more character options. There's a character option book in the pipe for a May release.
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Apr 6, 2014 15:25
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Lord knows it needs t. I tried making a character. At which point I found it was ludicrously easy to get specialized in Speed defense right out of the gate, and that all of the useful verbs ran off of Intellect. This was when I gave up hope and endeavored to just use Dungeon Planet for postapocalyptic science-fantasy weirdness.
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Apr 15, 2014 02:12
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You can get all the thus far released PDFs of the major sourcebooks for $18.86 here. It's a DriveThruRPG deal.
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May 16, 2014 19:44
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They just released a supplement of additional character options. Haven't bought it myself so I can't speak for its quality, but might be interesting to some. It's definitely the most substantial thing they added to the game since launch.
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May 21, 2014 19:37
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Covok posted:They just released a supplement of additional character options. Haven't bought it myself so I can't speak for its quality, but might be interesting to some. It's definitely the most substantial thing they added to the game since launch. I purchased it, and it adds a lot of fun options. I think the best one is one where you can summon a duplicate of your character to help you out with tasks and combat. Of course, some of this stuff looks broken as hell at a glance. Then again, I'm of the opinion that broken poo poo is more amusing than balanced stuff, most of the time.
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May 21, 2014 20:38
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SunAndSpring posted:I purchased it, and it adds a lot of fun options. I think the best one is one where you can summon a duplicate of your character to help you out with tasks and combat. Of course, some of this stuff looks broken as hell at a glance. Then again, I'm of the opinion that broken poo poo is more amusing than balanced stuff, most of the time. Broken across the board or only for nanos? Monte tends to make spellcasters pretty strong.
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May 21, 2014 22:58
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Covok posted:Broken across the board or only for nanos? Monte tends to make spellcasters pretty strong. The former. Everyone gets some crazy Foci that can be pretty useful.
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May 21, 2014 23:17
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FRINGE posted:edit: Further googling has led me into a brand-new chapter in the RPG gender war. Ugh. No one has these arguments about how Alien facehuggers are implying all pregnancy is rape, but somehow succubi imply all women are baby-seeking-monsters. Yeah other than the part where that comparison is awful (facehuggers are an explicit metaphor for rape and it's literally one of the main themes of the movie, succubi just have really really lovely implications behind them that aren't helped by Monte Cook being the Cat Piss Man archetype given flesh) ninja edit: seriously how the gently caress have you all not learned not to give this man money by now? He is literally everything wrong with this hobby condensed into a ball of ultra-dense dark matter and then formed into a humanoid shape. At least FATAL is entertaining, which is not something I can say for anything Monte Cook has ever worked on (except 3e, which largely wasn't his creation). SALT CURES HAM fucked around with this message at 17:21 on May 25, 2014 |
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May 25, 2014 17:18
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SALT CURES HAM posted:Yeah other than the part where that comparison is awful (facehuggers are an explicit metaphor for rape and it's literally one of the main themes of the movie, succubi just have really really lovely implications behind them that aren't helped by Monte Cook being the Cat Piss Man archetype given flesh) Aren't succubi just an allegory for females raping men, sort of like how a vampire is an allegory for men raping women? Outside of porn and Japanese stuff, most depictions of a succubus aren't exactly positive.
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May 25, 2014 18:05
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SunAndSpring posted:Aren't succubi just an allegory for females raping men, sort of like how a vampire is an allegory for men raping women? Outside of porn and Japanese stuff, most depictions of a succubus aren't exactly positive. In both cases literature has been rehabilitating them into things you can have consensual sex with. I'm not sure that argues either way, but it's an interesting parallel.
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May 25, 2014 18:18
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CottonWolf posted:In both cases literature has been rehabilitating them into things you can have consensual sex with. I'm not sure that argues either way, but it's an interesting parallel. Everyone of all genders really likes the idea of being willingly seduced by a total hottie, for probably obvious reasons. I think people more or less took the idea of "And then this man or woman who is so supernaturally intensely attractive has sex with you!!!" and starting realizing it sounds less like a horrible nightmare and more like basically the ideal situation. I mean the vampire threat was "those foreigners from Eastern Europe are going to sleep with your daughters," totally discounting that maybe the daughters are kinda into it. The succubus threat likewise lies pretty much entirely on hating your own sexual desires, totally discounting that if you're ok with sex, suddenly having a wicked hot demon magically poof into your room to bang will probably not have you start worrying for your soul. Which is also why pre-4e succubi are honestly an amazingly stupid monster, because they're based entirely on medieval thinking that basically no gamers are going to have. Succubi is a big box that says "SEX IS BAD," and when people disagree, D&D turns it into a dumb DM trick. Hah HAH, the lady you flirted with was actually a succubi, you instantly die! That's what you GET, Jeff! Maybe next time you'll think twice before actually trying to engage the world and trying to roleplay with the females! As is befitting of Numanumanera, Cook just took the succubi and wrote "ALSO SPACE" on it, so it's again just another dumb DM trick that punishes you for actually trying to engage with the setting. Except it's actually worse, because the real message behind your D&D succubus is "CASUAL SEX WITH LADIES IS BAD BECAUSE THEY'RE MONSTROUS WHORES WHO EAT YOUR SOUL!"
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May 25, 2014 19:27
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ProfessorCirno posted:Which is also why pre-4e succubi are honestly an amazingly stupid monster, because they're based entirely on medieval thinking that basically no gamers are going to have. Succubi is a big box that says "SEX IS BAD," and when people disagree, D&D turns it into a dumb DM trick. Hah HAH, the lady you flirted with was actually a succubi, you instantly die! That's what you GET, Jeff! Maybe next time you'll think twice before actually trying to engage the world and trying to roleplay with the females! As is befitting of Numanumanera, Cook just took the succubi and wrote "ALSO SPACE" on it, so it's again just another dumb DM trick that punishes you for actually trying to engage with the setting. Except it's actually worse, because the real message behind your D&D succubus is "CASUAL SEX WITH LADIES IS BAD BECAUSE THEY'RE MONSTROUS WHORES WHO EAT YOUR SOUL!" Except that in Numenera's case it's the son who is birthed who will then chase down and kill the father. So it's more of a Mordred/Authurian parallel than a traditional succubus deal. e: i.e. Monte Cook read the Dark Tower and thought it was cool. CottonWolf fucked around with this message at 19:45 on May 25, 2014 |
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May 25, 2014 19:37
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CottonWolf posted:Except that in Numenera's case it's the son who is birthed who will then chase down and kill the father. So it's more of a Mordred/Authurian parallel than a traditional succubus deal. That doesn't actually discount anything I typed out though, it's just trading "SLUTS STEAL YOU SOUL" for "CHILD WELFARE LITERALLY MURDERS YOU." It's not a Mordred/Authurian parallel because there was an actual meaning to that. This isn't some grand betrayal of the self through accursed infidelity damning your leadership, it's you hooked up with a girl? Here's your punishment. It's still a somewhat bland punishment for engaging with the setting apropos of nothing to teach a morality lesson nobody actually believes ("sex is bad"). Again, it relies on medieval morality that nobody nowadays shares. EDIT: CottonWolf posted:e: i.e. Monte Cook read the Dark Tower and thought it was cool. I cannot think of a greater damnation someone could commit then copying from the latter Dark Tower books 
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May 25, 2014 19:49
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ProfessorCirno posted:That doesn't actually discount anything I typed out though, it's just trading "SLUTS STEAL YOU SOUL" for "CHILD WELFARE LITERALLY MURDERS YOU." It's not a Mordred/Authurian parallel because there was an actual meaning to that. This isn't some grand betrayal of the self through accursed infidelity damning your leadership, it's you hooked up with a girl? Here's your punishment. Agreed with both points. I don't like using gimmicky poo poo like succubi or what not because it feels really petty to try and gently caress your players over with stuff like that. Mimics are fair use to me because a party should expect chests to be trapped, but succubi just make you paranoid of any woman in a bar ever and it basically turns a wary party into a bunch of social retards who don't talk to or help any girl whatsoever. Also, god drat why did The Dark Tower fall off so hard in quality. The first 4 were really cool and then the last 3 had me scratching my head to the bullshit contained within them.
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May 25, 2014 20:11
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ProfessorCirno posted:Hah HAH, the lady you flirted with was actually a succubi, you instantly die! That's what you GET, Jeff! The problem is not with DnD, it its with your friends. The same as the bulk of the "reasons DnD is bad". I have run into exactly one GM that was the cartoonish power-crazed villain everyone pretends is running every game. (It was the only time I played Pathfinder.) I played once and didnt go back. Problem solved.
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May 25, 2014 21:00
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SunAndSpring posted:Agreed with both points. I don't like using gimmicky poo poo like succubi or what not because it feels really petty to try and gently caress your players over with stuff like that. Mimics are fair use to me because a party should expect chests to be trapped, but succubi just make you paranoid of any woman in a bar ever and it basically turns a wary party into a bunch of social retards who don't talk to or help any girl whatsoever. Mimics turn the party into 10' pole-wielding paranoiacs at least as fast as a succubus will make them avoidant sociopaths. You need NPCs for plot so at least some of them must be trustworthy, unless the DM is a nutbar. And if the DM is a player-hating nutbar, the "killer traps every room" DM is way more common than the "every NPC wants to betray you" DM. Maybe the opposite if you are playing Vampire, I guess. NPC treachery can also be way more entertaining than random dungeon traps. SALT CURES HAM posted:ninja edit: seriously how the gently caress have you all not learned not to give this man money by now? He is literally everything wrong with this hobby condensed into a ball of ultra-dense dark matter and then formed into a humanoid shape. At least FATAL is entertaining, which is not something I can say for anything Monte Cook has ever worked on (except 3e, which largely wasn't his creation). The Planeswalker Handbook Dead Gods, The Great Modron March, Tales from the Infinite Staircase A Paladin in Hell Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil Arcana Evolved The Books of Eldritch Might Dark Matter gently caress YOU MONTE COOK YOU ARE THE LEAST ORIGINAL AND ENTERTAINING FUCKWIT EVER How do you think ignorant internet circle jerks are for the hobby? As bad as all of what Cook contributed? Of course Numenera is a poor system but this hate is pure asshat ejaculate.
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May 25, 2014 21:21
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