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My Lovely Horse posted:The backgrounds my group came up with were a huge help to us in fleshing out the setting, but what I've noticed tends to happen is that some backgrounds are open enough so they can apply to almost anything while others barely ever get used. This happens even in 13th Age itself is the thing, I have one player in particular whose background of "Former Lieutenant in the Lich King's Army" is used for almost everything. There really isn't anything actually wrong with this though, I don't think.
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Apr 18, 2015 01:19
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AXE COP posted:I feel like extended rests were meant to have some element of danger anyway. It's why Drow and Warforged have those 'you don't have to sleep and are still aware while resting' traits and you can take feats that remove the perception penalty for allies and stuff. I think that stuff is all legacy mechanics from earlier editions.
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Apr 22, 2015 20:03
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My Lovely Horse posted:I'd usually give them one at-will power from the emulated class and plug in monster attack and damage values, which is probably the single most important thing you absolutely must do Yeah when I was very early in my 4e career I just stated up an enemy cleric using the NPC rules to support a dragon because I was a god drat idiot and she got pasted in like two attacks from, I think, the party cleric because Holy War. I love the idea of interrupt chains because I want to either recreate the like seven hit parry-counterparry chains from MGR or have an excuse to go all  on the opponent, bustin' out my trap cards. But it just ends up going "oh gently caress, the reason this monster is half dead is because I forgot about this power!" or people getting confused about what effects what and so on... it's the sort of thing I think would work great in a videogame where all that back end stuff is automated.
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Apr 26, 2015 12:46
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Section Z posted:Champions/HERO was my first proper longer than a few sessions delve in and learning the mechanics shot at playing PnP with people. You still using MM1 straight up? I seem to remember, Rage Drakes I think, being insanely tough for their level and stuff.
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May 3, 2015 15:17
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RPZip posted:It also removes one of the good things backgrounds are used for, namely patching the sometimes over-restrictive class skill lists and giving people more flexibility in character design. Most games I've seen ban it, which is the right decision I think. I don't think this part is actually an issue, as the whole point of baking the effects of Born Under a Bad Sign/Auspicious Birth, presumably, means that the background slot is still open for use. The effect of those two options is too good, which is a bad design as you're kind of loving yourself over if you don't take it. Either bake it in or chuck it out.
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May 21, 2015 01:04
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LightWarden posted:I'd actually let it be used for item creation options like potions, consumables, ritual scrolls, magic ammo or even magic items in general with the caveat that whenever you make an item using the pool it depletes the maximum value of the pool until that item is either used up (in the case of consumables), disenchanted and returned to the pool or just bought by a member of the party who decides they really want to keep it around long-term. This I like this idea a lot. After reading through zeitgeist, and how in that magic items are requisitions from head office or whatever that you need to return, I was kicking around a Stock/Procure system like from Double Cross where you have a Stock of items you just always have available (tying that to the wealth by level guidelines and equipment), and then a renewable slush fund of Procurement that you can use to get a hold of anything in a pinch, but it's only temporary and tends to be more expensive, tying rituals into that has potential. Money and such in games has never really interested me, in DnD especially, and I always abstract it away when DMing anyway, if I ever go back to playing 4e I'll need to see if this is feasible.
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May 29, 2015 19:58
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The best idea is to have the result be open ended, and not have a fixed "this is the right path" idea in the first place.
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Jun 8, 2015 23:55
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I'm a big fan of the judge just endlessly criticises everything the players have done, if they stop to help the cart, it shows a lack of concern for the big picture, if they don't help a cat out a tree they are heartless monsters unconcerned with the problems of their lessers, if they don't give a beggar water they are selfish, if they do, they are ignoring the importance of their quest on trivial matters etc. And the real lesson is to stand up against the judge for what they believe in, and that the truly noble of spirit should be assured and confident in the strength of their goals and convictions.
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Jun 10, 2015 02:09
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Misandu posted:I also meant that I think 4e works a lot better if you include some really one sided stomps every now and again, especially at low levels. Spend a fight or two establishing to the players which enemies are threatening and which aren't, then give them a fight against something like 6 minions, a Soldier and a Lurker who shows up on Round 2. Should end during Round 3 and the reduced complexity will keep them from taking more then a few minutes per turn. I think it works to establish tone too. Typically 4e is meant to be a game where your main dudes are all badasses right from the get go, but if you spend early levels just getting your rear end handed to you by a bunch of kobolds and zombies then you start to feel like maybe you're just some dirtfarming peasant who got ideas above his station. A scene where your merry little band fights off 20 dudes with no effort makes you feel like Gilgamesh.
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Jun 25, 2015 18:51
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Large enemies are a lot easier to position AOE bursts and such on without needing to worry about your allies because the z-axis exists.
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Aug 15, 2015 04:17
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Really Pants posted:How does cover work with Large and larger creatures? Do you have to be able to draw unbroken lines to the creature's entire space, or just one of the squares it takes up? I think it is two corners of any square the creature occupies.
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Aug 22, 2015 02:39
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Lurdiak posted:Hey guys, I can't really see if there's a better thread to ask this in, but can any of you tell me what that one undead DnD monster that's like, some kind of knight tied to an evil sword is called? I know that's rather vague, sorry. They retain their intellect and memories, I think. I'm pretty sure it isn't Death Knights. It's a Death Knight. The monster template is in MM1 if I remember right. 
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Aug 26, 2015 20:32
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I don't see how 5e fixes anything aside from maybe making me move towards more socially acceptable hobbies.
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Sep 22, 2015 19:09
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wallawallawingwang posted:The Tenra Bansho Zero RPG has a cool solution to this issue. Players can basically set a flag on their characters for a scene and while this flag is up the character gets access to extra power but is also killable. Haha, this is awesome. You gain incredible Cutscene power, able to pull of stunts and feats you never normally could, but the risk is there that Sephiroth is gonna stab you in your torso.
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Oct 29, 2015 23:44
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My Lovely Horse posted:Ugh I'm hitting a total roadblock on designing this combat map. Straight up steal Leane's Square from Chrono Trigger
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Nov 18, 2015 02:06
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Straight up steal the Opera from FFVI for background.
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Nov 18, 2015 21:28
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Really Pants posted:Does XCOM count? Did anyone ever write up an Enemy Within/Unknown 4e conversion? I've been sorely tempted the last few days....
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Dec 22, 2015 18:55
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Basically you can appear to be Dexter, but you wanna have the mindset of a Deedee.
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Feb 4, 2016 18:50
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In praise of defenders, there was a dramatic boss fight we were having on like the third game of 4e I ever ran and the Ranger hadn't realised that he had the durability of a wet paper towel. The Orc Warboss swung down his hammer to kill the ranger, who happened to be standing next to the Fighter who proceeded to smash the Orc's head into a greasy smear on the wall, saving his life. Awesome times. Also in a later game I played in my Paladin samurai had the basic strategy of "mark everyone in the room, be untouchable, have temp HP out the wazoo" so that was fun. I have bad experiences with controllers, though not the same ones you guys have. In my experience controllers have only ever been played by the person who only starts thinking about her move on her turn, spends five minutes considering options, then just uses magic missile again.
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Feb 6, 2016 16:10
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Tatum Girlparts posted:Honestly being a dirtbag elf who fights like he's in a Jet-Li movie is pretty hard to argue against. Yeah, that one was a lot of fun. My DM was a bit perplexed that I wanted to play John Preston in a fantasy game, but everyone enjoyed it.
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Feb 17, 2016 02:36
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Mike Mearls?
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Feb 29, 2016 22:01
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dwarf74 posted:
Put trigger warnings on your posts please.
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Apr 22, 2016 19:10
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: "Sorry... flip flip flip ... I need to look up the exact ... flip flip wording of this ... read read read read read hmmmm.... no, I think instead I'll ... flip flip flip-flip-flip flip hmmm, no.... okay. I'll just cast um ... Magic Missile."
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Or a Revenant.
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May 15, 2016 21:00
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No Luck Needed posted:If you have to carrot and stick people into playing D&D 4e, then don't play it. I can agree with this sentence. If you feel you have to carrot and stick your players into playing any game, you probably shouldn't be running one. Good advice.
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Jun 2, 2016 20:24
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ImpactVector posted:Temp HP never stacks, so if that's supposed to be an upper limit on it that's not how it works. Though now that I think about it maybe that was errata. No, I'm pretty sure it's in the PHB.
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Jun 2, 2016 22:11
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I'm glad I'm on both lists! My single line of snark cut real deep apparently. If I think of examples from fantasy novels that are actually good, rather than garbage D&D tie in novels, I can think of a couple of examples of groups where everyone is on a similar "level". But to use a more universal example that's been brought up before, it's true that Jimmy Olsen and Superman probably aren't on the same level, but if you're playing D&D you're playing the Justice League who are on the same level, if with different specialisations. And while different tiers of combat ability are fine amongst a party in some games, those (ideally) still have the characters possess equal narrative agency to affect the game, whereas in D&D 4e both your combat and out of combat powers come from levels and are linked, as well as combat being a primary focus. Not even mentioning how even a few levels difference create a huge insurmountable gap because of how the game math works.
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Jun 3, 2016 09:56
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My Lovely Horse posted:Idea for a second encounter: fight a d4, d6, d8, d10, d12 and a d20. Man this meta-game mechanical stuff just writes itself. Who would've guessed that Trad Games poster My Lovely Horse was secretly Grant Morrison all along?
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Aug 25, 2016 15:20
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Son of Mercy is how I went with my Straladin of the Raven Queen, I very much recommend it. I also took the moon crescent power because my guy was a Samurai with a fullblade and my mission was to be as anime as possible and that poo poo straight makes you Roronoa Zoro.
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Sep 9, 2016 15:45
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Kurieg posted:There's an encounter from the Dragon magazine focusing on the moon Goddess that had a Paladin attack power that turns into a range 10 power if you're using a heavy blade because you're cutting a moon into the air that shoots out and hits someone. I guess it shows just how different people's interpretation of the same text can be, because I always saw it as more this 
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Sep 10, 2016 14:53
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I like the idea because it reminds me of Knightmare
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Sep 10, 2016 19:21
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dwarf74 posted:Daily balance is an issue in all D&D's, yes. Personally, though, I'd rather tweak what a rest means - maybe change it to a "refresh" or whatever - than do away with them entirely. Yeah I'm a fan of 13th Age's system where it is purely based on encounters rather than tied to time or resting or anything, though the game still infuriatingly refers to it as a "day". I think, though, yeah, I also just kind of find the idea of "daily" abilities something of a worthless thing in general, and would rather balance the game around the encounter. For all it's many, many, many flaws, one thing I liked about FF13 was that every fight was, for the most part, completely balanced around your party always being at 100% going in. But then, the whole attrition factor in games has never really appealed to me, I far prefer it being like a movie where the hero can always work through unless they take some kind of narrative "injury" or the like.
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Sep 25, 2016 16:36
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