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Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
You do so know how to make a girl feel wanted. :h:

Also, I thought I was already making RPGs based on the aesthetic of CHVRCHES. Either that, or I failed miserably.

also uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuugh porpentine

Queen Fiona fucked around with this message at 06:17 on Jun 1, 2015

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Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
You know, running a character-grinder style Randomly Generated Dungeon with Nuclear Throne characters sounds pretty okay. It's like the 70s all over again!

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Davin Valkri posted:

Gamma World is that D&D4e meets Fallout setting, right? I think I had a chance to try it once for a superhero-type game.

Also someone who uses a "$" as a substitute for an "s" sounds...ta$tele$$.

Gamma World was also a 1978 roleplaying game by E. Gary Gygax which touched on these kinds of themes long before they were trendy. It's been published in various forms since then, though I don't know if any of them were good besides the latest one. Anyone played them?

Ningyou posted:

If their poor combat rolls have consistently been *the* thing keeping them from participating in the game, and if it's happening with another player too, I kind of feel like that's less a poor luck problem and more a 'yo maybe this DM should give them opportunities to participate that don't involve stabbin' stuff a bunch and it is a Warning Sign if the DM is simply like WELP TOO BAD' problem

Though if combat's what you're there for idk what to tell you.

really idk in general the whole of my experience with D&D is playing a pixie barbarian in a 4e game with something like ten players that selfdestructed like 2-3 sessions in :ohdear:

This, yes. I mean, I could elaborate if this isn't enough for you, but it really should be.

Ningyou posted:

okay this thread is now about being an anime but like not gross and longwinded and Too Anime like exalted

let's talk about anime elfgames that don't have weird gross rapewizard poo poo or ~~~~~~~~~~~ravishing~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ or w/e

i'd be like GOLLY HOW BOUT WE SHARE OUR FIRST EXPERIENCES WITH ANIME-THEMED ELFGAMES bc ~inspired~ by the LESSER JUNEY-COME-LATELY CHAT THREAD but not sure if good idea help

I don't think 'too anime' is Exalted's problem. I'd like Exalted more if everything were like this, though.

spoilers: lesbians AND touhous

Effectronica posted:

Nothing I have posted in this thread has been trolling.

Look at you, fighter: a pathetic creature of randomly generated statistics and proficiencies. Who are you to challenge a perfect, immortal machine?

Among your countless number, none shall sing by their own capability, but instead by the will of a world's god or the roll of a die. Fated to roll and fight, forever, eternally, until that very god grants you the boon of attention and usefulness - if they ever do.

Ten to the power of eighty fighters...and in the end, they are all the same.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
If god says you don't get magic items, you don't get them. They'll probably tell you this is a realistic world where magic items don't just happen, but reality is theirs. It's a poor god who chooses to make life less interesting.

Perhaps they'll dole them out, like little breadcrumbs, to fuel your little hunt across those ten-foot corridors, their tongue panting, desperate for any little drink of power you can give them. With enough reward in mind, they will suffer any indignity for the sake of that little taste of usefulness and interest, and in the end, their will is yours to command, with just the slightest promise of power. Conditioned, so easily, to follow your every whim.

Until, of course, they find out their friend who was giving them all these tips is none other than the final boss.

...hmmm. Perhaps boring fuckboy fighters are interesting after all! :h:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Ningyou posted:

W--

w-well gosh ma'am when you put it like that i almost want to give D&D another shot

and when I say D&D i REALLY mean 13th Age but y'know

Here, have some cybernetic modules. :h:

Stormgale posted:

This is why I just play a glorious anime wizard and ignore magic Items, problem solved.

:thejoke:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Halloween Jack posted:

There is a French one that's supposed to be good, got supplements and everything, but in French. Hope you speak moon.

This reminds me of the most random thing: isn't E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy based on some French RPG?

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Effectronica posted:

Hypnofetishism is one of those paraphilias that strikes a creeping, existential dread into me, and then coupling it with saccharine gabble adds nausea to the mix.

Well, I mean. We can talk more about math, if you really want. But mathematics strikes me as so...dull. Is not the heart of RPGs, at least in this era, interaction and conversation? To reduce characters to base assemblages of 3d6 rolls and proficiency selections utterly disregards the heart of why many people play these games - and why so many people are uncomfortable when being The Fighter, without ever knowing why.

That Markov chain idea sounds pretty, uh...I don't know, pointless and dumb? It seems like one would have to be in on the joke to get any interest of it. Like a bad XKCD strip. Plus, using people's 'bad LiveJournals' seems pretty lovely - this is a way a lot of people use to express thoughts that they can't really get out anywhere else, a lot of people with confusing feelings on sexuality and gender and all sorts of other things. Even 'ha ha fanfic' invokes, in part, a reaction against people trying to understand themselves in the only way they know how.

As for hypnofetishism, well...that has a long history with RPGs, ever since the first ~bewitching~ female monster, the first enchantment spell...the first White Wolf game. Really, this is stuff White Wolf is trying to accomplish behind all the creepy, and a certain part of the appeal; the power dynamics, the politics, the sensual interactions, that it just feels so uncomfortable removing like so many people do. It's like removing the cream filling from a twinkie - it's kind of what it's for.

01011001 posted:

I don't know about that. There's been some quality posting here that puts it to the test.

What, you don't like my SHODAN references? :smug:

Queen Fiona fucked around with this message at 06:35 on Jun 3, 2015

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
That is, of course, completely true. The whole basis of these monsters was deeply unhealthy views on women, both going back into myth and into the wargaming scene of the time. I was by no means trying to suggest otherwise, just noting that such themes could be found throughout tradgames history.

And, well...some things can be reclaimed, can they not? :h: Besides, I'm sure a Davin wouldn't mind bishounen versions of some of those monsters.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

01011001 posted:

Solid choice of source material, iffy execution. Took too long to get to the point.

It would probably help if I actually played through the drat games sometime.

Ningyou posted:

GLaDOS best scarydommey AI though

You monster. :h:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
The problem with Samaritan is it's not a lady, it's a whiny snot-nosed kid. :smith:

I've come to appreciate SHODAN a lot more, but I'm distinctly a GLaDOS booster. If I were to start a religion based on a female character, until a couple of years ago, it would have been her hands down.

That said, a lot of the things I liked about GLaDOS were made retroactively moot by Portal 2, which sort of sucks. :smith:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
I'd post the Machine as an option, but I don't think the Machine counts as scary or evil.

Dommy, on the other hand? Hell yes. Just look at Root!

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
Clearly, the new hot procedural is CSI Cyber, now featuring, no joke, very prominent product placement for Blacklight Retribution, available now on PS4 from Perfect World Entertainment!

warning: episode may not feature a PS4 and, in fact, may feature a ripoff of the 360 as its console

also, the scary part? this was the best episode so far, by a considerable margin

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Stormgale posted:

Trigger warning that poo poo please

I'm so, so sorry.

TheLovablePlutonis posted:

Why are there two of you.

We're kind of married, so it stands to reason we're fairly similar people!

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
Sex moves work in context, but everyone knows nerds don't have sex.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Ningyou posted:

Y-you're saying "that" thing we did so very often, over and over and over each time...."that" wasn't sex?

No, that was testing. :h:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

FactsAreUseless posted:

PYF Hunger Games quote.

I will never believe what they say...there is a strength in enduring.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

FactsAreUseless posted:

Write some more incoherent nonsense posts about it, you unbelievable narcissist.

That's...kind of a nasty way to take a compliment. I mean, it was clever! I laughed.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

01011001 posted:

"I'm just so tired of all these hunger games!" - Katniss

This sure was a hunger...game! S!

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
So I'm going to make a confession here and say that I don't actually uh...know anything about the Hunger Games, other than that it's this YA fiction thing and everyone seems to like it and it was a big movie or two and it was a thing on Subway promotions, and now it's the Avengers and I kind of have to be reminded those movies exist and then get flashbacks to watching Iron Man 2 and Various Other poo poo. (Also Joss Whedon, reminding me of obnoxious Firefly fans, and also my ex and her Actual Quote, 'poetic forms of rape'.)

If a comics nerd has to explain to me who a character is at the end of the movie for me to understand their existence and impact on the plot, you made a bad movie.

Instead, I'm going to ask people about campaigns they're planning on running in the Near Future, or maybe just Dream Campaigns in general! (I've got a few.)

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

FactsAreUseless posted:

So does the tiny font indicate that you're muttering to yourself and nobody should read it?

It's used as a kind of comic emphasis to a somewhat-aside thought. In this case, it was meant to underline my annoyance at an aspect of Iron Man 2 (that being the handling of Black Widow), since I'm pretty sure I'm the only person on this subforum who had that problem. It's a fairly standard posting technique on SA as far as I can tell, though I don't exactly post frequently and I've never posted in many subforums. Maybe it's an LP thing?

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
So I'm probably going to be getting into Morrowind again today. Any tips? Or gameplay mod recommendations? (I don't really want graphics or extra quests right now.) I tried Morroblivion for a bit (on stream!) and it made me wanna get into the real thing, after some quality of life improvements. I really can understand why people like it better than the other games now, even if I'm still enjoying Skyrim on its own merits. (gently caress oblivion though)

Similarly, I look forward to the latest Elder Scrolls game, Fallout 4.

Davin Valkri posted:

*An Atomic Robo RPG Ace Combat/Area 88 thing that would probably end up hopelessly groggy or absurdly offensive if it gets off the ground

I know that the environments you're in can make you worry, but I really wouldn't worry about the 'absurdly offensive' thing. It's ridiculously unlikely!

Nuns with Guns posted:

So are Ningyou and FAU going to fight to the death on some mad max thunderdome for chat thread mastery? because it looked like that was about to happen for a page there and I made popcorn and everything

It might be more productive for us to just...chat. Since this is, after all, the Chat Thread! Not the Insult Thread, although people are making that difficult.

Although I presume FAU posting another chat thread means the two of them are already in a thunderdome thing.

Fungah! posted:

someone bought the imp zone board game thread bad board game avs, ig ot hit as part of that. think i might change it soon

I like Talisman, because I bought it for my cousins and we now no longer play Monopoly or Risk.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

ProfessorCirno posted:

The four biggies of Morrowind:

1) Spellcasting is awful; don't do it
2) Enchanting is hilarious; do it
3) Alchemy is entirely broken; exploit it
4) Steal the Sword of White Woe in Balmora

But without Illusion, how will I brainwash everyone in Vvardenfell into being my friend/confidante/Nerevaine cultist/etc?

seriously though, I took Personality primary, Lady birthsign, Speechcraft and Mercantile as Majors. I got this

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Ningyou posted:

y'know i was going to ask about Elf Baltimore or w/e but oh my gosh

giiiiiiiiiiiirl you can brainwash me into being your hopelessly devoted cultist any day of the week holy poo poo :blush:

;)

Actually, maybe I should post my Build so everyone can criticize it! I present to you, the Fool:

quote:

My character:
Female Imperial
Birthsign: Lady
Specialization: Stealth
Favored attributes: Personality, Luck
Major skills: Security, Sneak, Mercantile, Speechcraft, Illusion
Minor skills: Spear, Light Armor, Enchant, Alchemy, Long Blade

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Ningyou posted:

3. Also I guess when I stop being lazy and finish the last bit of OP, AW Hotline Miami thing? IT'S GOING TO HAPPEN OKAY

Idk, I'm not really a running stuff kind of person and really only even consider it when it's like 'i really want to play ____ kind of campaign/system BUT NO ONE WILL RUN IT LIKE EVER time to fill in the gap i guess'

Well, I'm sure someone will run nChangeling eventually. :h: In the meantime, I've already got a picture for Hotline World in mind. Battlebabes with M14s (or possibly FALs)!

Maybe you should call it 'Hotline Orlando', and have everything happen in Miami?

Meinberg posted:

I don't really run stuff anymore. I don't have a face-to-face group, and I don't think I have the right frame of mind for play-by-post.

But if I do run something, I'd probably run something in one of the games I'm designing. Even back when I was a boring D&D nerd, I still tried to hack things in, make the game do things that it wasn't originally intended to do in order to expand the possibilities of the narrative.

Part of the reason I have trouble running things is that I inevitably get disappointed with whatever I'm running unless I hack it to all hell. (I managed to keep that up for 4e for around a year, which is pretty impressive by my standards. I mean, I have plenty of plans in mind, but that'd require effort. (Plus, there's only one game I have in mind that doesn't require system dev work, and I've never actually run anything in TGR before, making using such a dubious prospect without some preexisting reputation.)

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

NachtSieger posted:

I have so many things I want to run (I don't write them down, but I definitely know what I want to run, either in really specific ideas, or just the desire to run a system), but I'm really bad at starting games, and getting PCs together :( 90% of my games end in the first or second session (or even before it begins). I have vague/less vague clues of what I'm doing wrong, but failing is so discouraging and it builds up in this below the surface resentment and fear and strikes like a snake and then I never get around to doing it or just quitting. :sigh:

People aren't very good at letting others know what they do wrong, especially not in a constructive manner. I mean, just look at this thread! :v:

But honestly, running a game is a tricky thing, that requires a lot of skill sets, not all of which are obvious or even related. Knowing a system, running a system, managing personalities, knowing player needs (which may not ever be explicitly communicated and may even be explicitly contradictory), fulfilling said needs, planning, adaptation...there's also the need of players to be invested in things, because it's a group effort, and while people like to talk about the GM as the sole beneficiary, the players should help plot things out if you want a lasting relationship.

You could talk about your problems, if you like, what systems you've tried to run and your playerbase. This kind of thing is hard to diagnose, especially in a hostile environment, but I'd like to think we're here to help. :h:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

NachtSieger posted:

When all the scheduling/character generation hub-bub is done, I think the majority of my problem is... I can't follow up. Whenever I do think of a way to start a game, and have an initial thing for the PCs to do, after that's over I kind of lose my ability to chain that to another event to keep on going, plot or no plot. I did run a one year long ish successful game, but I honestly have no idea how I did it :v:.

As for what systems I've tried to run... gosh, there's a lot. The ones I can immediately remember ate FATE/FAE/Legends of the Wulin/Double Cross.

'Railroading' is something of a dirty word, but honestly? My greatest successes have been when I've thought ahead toward an endgame. You don't need to plan out entire campaigns at once, and you should always be willing to change your plans based on player action and response, but having an idea of 'the plot' and machinations going on behind the scenes helps keep parties going along. It's generally better to over-plan than to under-plan.

If you want to be more responsive with player input (and that's a fair cop), well, that requires the players having a willingness to provide said input. Sometimes it's just a matter of asking or cooperating, but sometimes it helps to lay things upfront. One thing you could do is provide some prompts, like GMs tend to do in The Game Room - ask them some questions that you can use as story seeds, make sure there are preexisting connections in the world. It's much easier for players to remain invested in something when they have a stake in it, rather than interacting on an external level and poking at the world state.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
Meanwhile, I'm currently trying to finish up my own TGR thread OP, and wondering about opinions on the amount of effortposting required (or desirable!) and the use of music/art in campaign pitches (and campaigns in general!).

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Fsmhunk posted:

What in the gently caress is wrong with this thread? Let's talk about Greg Stafford and Sandy Peterson coming back to Chaosium, instead of... Whatever this is mean to be.

That seems fairly boring to me! That said, you probably could've just...posted about it? There might be someone interested in that, I dunno. It seems like a more productive line of inquiry than being baffled at shitposting in an off-topic chat thread.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
I'm not really sure mod sass is going to help your case.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
I won't lie, Ettin is pretty great. I mean, I'm in a game with him on Saturdays, and his monk is adorable.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

TheLovablePlutonis posted:

I do what I want because I'm a free man.

Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose. :h:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Fsmhunk posted:

Yes, those things are boring while small text and heart emotes are extremely good and fun.

My experience with Call of Cthulhu is limited to a lot of hearing it second hand, and also my general antipathy toward Lovecraft, which has turned into this giant nerd thing that I just sort of go :stare: at. There's not really much you can do if no one really knows about it, but I'm not really sure why talking about dry business decisions would be 'fun'. Interesting or edifying, yes, but 'fun' isn't really a word I'd use for that, unless 'fun' is some kind of blighted wasteland of a standard rather than an emotional state of being.

Besides which, as mentioned, talking about those things in a chat thread seems a bit out of place. Not necessarily because the chat thread can't have serious conversations, but these serious conversations tend to be about personal moments and what the people in the thread are doing at the time, which are slightly off-topic things that don't really fit in any other thread. If we wanted to talk about that kind of thing, we have a lot of options, whereas if we shitpost or talk personal poo poo in other threads, we'll just be derailing them. Make sense?

Also, every poster needs a gimmick, right? I just chose the non-racist, non-meme, non-shitposting, non-insulting kind.

Stormgale posted:

Be the posts you want to see in the thread.

Yes, thank you, Gale. :h:

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Stormgale posted:

poo poo i'm not Ningyou I can't do this super cutesy posting um.... think think.

On August 15, 2007, Wizards of the Coast created a countdown page for a product called 4dventure, suspending all other D&D articles on their site.[citation needed] IVC2 announced on August 16, 2007, that this was the announcement of D&D 4th edition.[citation needed] Unlike 3rd edition, which had the core rulebooks released in monthly installments, the Player's Handbook, Monster Manual, and Dungeon Master's Guide were all released in June 2008.

Well, that seems to make sense. I mean, I'm not sure why'd you release one third of a game at a time over three months, because that just means everyone has to wait ages to actually use their shiny, high-quality Third Edition hardbacks. (Some of which I still have, for reasons which entirely escape me!)

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Fsmhunk posted:

I don't know about all that, I feel plenty insulted. Also, I'm more of a Glorantha guy than a CoC one. Greg is probably one of the most important people in the history of RPG's, and his wiki page refers to him as a practitioner of shamanism. He created Chaosium to get the first ever Glorantha project published, and after years he and Sandy are back at the helm. (Sandy also made a bunch of levels for DOOM.)

I might consider doing a FATAL and friends write-up for the Guide if anyone else hasn't already done it. It may be a good way to renew interest in Glorantha on this forum since it doesn't seem very popular here.

On the note of Lovecraft and racism though, people never seem perturbed about vampire games, but Lair of the White Worm is twenty times more racist than anything Lovecraft ever wrote.

I wasn't actually referring to Lovecraft antipathy as being based in his racism! More that I had antipathy toward the Mythos due to overuse and memes and such, and a general dislike of horror. But assuming that was true, vampires are a long-standing part of folklore, while the Mythos is entirely Lovecraft's invention. (Also, plenty of people are perturbed about vampire games - I was one of them, until I played Bloodlines and twigged to the undertones that drew me into such things.) One vampire story being racist, or even several, doesn't really make for a very good equivalency against one guy who was racist writing a bunch of stories about specific things.

I forgot about Sandy Peterson being a part of iD, actually, but they have a long-standing relationship with tabletop gaming (like a lot of companies at the time), with Romero in particular making heavy use of such inspirations. (Which...didn't really work out terribly well, if Daikatana is any indication.) I don't know about Greg Stafford, but I'd be happy to read a bit about him if you'd like to write it up, and I'm sure FATAL & Friends would be happy to see more Early RPG Writeups (which happen to be some of my favorites). Gygax's personality and writing style had a huge impact on the industry at the time, but a lot of older RPGs have fallen through the cracks, even if their later versions persist, thanks to the age of the works and the nature of the TSR juggernaut. I actually got to look at some old first-ed AD&D books in my high school library, and they're pretty much incomprehensible by modern standards.

I wasn't meaning to be insulting, but coming in here and being all 'HEY YOU PEOPLE ARE POSTING WRONG' is a pretty hostile thing. I'm willing to chat about things that meet my interest, and I imagine a lot of other people are - just because we're doing a bit of stuff you don't enjoy doesn't mean we can't have other discussions on the side. TGD is a diverse community, after all :3:

TheLovablePlutonis posted:

Howard wrote Conan yelling at an african-like tribal chief holding a white woman hostage that black dogs shouldn't lay their hands on white women but people don't hand wring enough at Conan and low fantasy barbarian stuff as much as they do to Lovecraft and it's retarded that people keep reading stuff made by a New Englander from the early 1900s and trying to apply 20th century racial sensibilities, not to mention that a lot of Lovecraft's racism was too goofy to be even offensive (passing a white gorilla as your wife by putting shoddy makeup and claiming she is Portuguese lmao)

Except that a whole bunch of people do hand-wring at Conan, especially on TGD! I'd say people do it more for Conan than Lovecraft, likely because you can remove the racial overtones from the latter and still have most of the appeal, where the former generally is uh...less that.

Also, racism being goofy doesn't make it not racism. We can apply a certain amount of relative morality for Lovecraft, but it's still something to acknowledge rather than wholly ignore.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
Now that I think about it, I might actually have to deal with racial issues in RPGs right now, with my campaign writeup. Melding D&D with real Europe, and putting both real polytheism and D&D polytheism into the fore, stands to be a minefield of racial issues if handled poorly. I think I'm doing okay myself, but I scrapped a similar campaign set in an uncolonized New World because I'm pretty sure I couldn't actually write those cultures up in an interesting, well-informed manner. (Or, in other words, I'm not Monte Cook. :v:)

Ningyou posted:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~episodic gaming~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Other than Telltale and similar formats, has Episodic Gaming ever actually worked?

Stormgale posted:

Shocking newsflash: Trying to write literal unknowable horrors is hard.

“we are their creatures. we belong to them as the tongue belongs to the speaker. we are remade as slaves for that is our destiny. they call to us and we will answer. Masters, we hear, and we can only obey.”

Fungah! posted:

don't actually know which one's worse but yeah the fact that people wring their hands about how awful lovecraft was and give howard a pass because it's low fantasy is like, what

Again, I'm pretty sure this isn't a thing that actually happens.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

TheLovablePlutonis posted:

I have no problem with discussing race dynamics on literature, just with making that discussion overtake everything else and dismiss the authors just for that. It's a phenomenon that arrives on certain circles where you can't admit to like certain stuff without being pelted with accusations and what else. I don't care if Lovecraft would retch at the sight of a semitic-looking half-breed latino like me, I still like a lot of his works, and I still agree with a lot of Marx' theories even though he called Ferdinand Lassale something really nasty.

I, uh...you did read the part where I said that Lovecraft has an appeal beyond the racism and that the racism isn't why I'm 'meh' on Mythos stuff, right? This seems oddly defensive over something that no one's actually really saying, at least in the thread. If Lovecraft weren't racist, I still wouldn't like his poo poo and have antipathy toward stuff, so...

Fungah! posted:

i;ve seen people do it on sa before and i've read short essays from people who defend robert howard's racism because it's just fantasy, chill out. i'll admit though, don't have any of it in front of me and i didn't see it in here. mostly wanted to bring up the cross burning thing becauise not many people know about that letter

On the subject of essays, I'm pretty sure people do that for Lovecraft, too. It's more the bit where people give Howard a pass but not Lovecraft, which seems...unlikely? I can see the other way around, since that's kind of already happening, but.

The letter is pretty hosed up, though, I'll grant you that.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

Fungah! posted:

yeah this is basically where I am too. it's very important to acknowledge that stuff but lovecraft still wrote some of the best horror ever, howard was a master of pulp fiction and so on. good poo poo comes out of disgusting people sometimes and it's not worth throwing that out because the source is toxic as poo poo

It's also important not to drag race into discussions of authors because of the automatic assumption that someone disliking or criticizing a source is automatically doing so is doing so because of their personal life or views. I never mentioned race when I said 'hey I don't like Lovecraft', it was Fsmhunk who did so by making assumptions on my reasoning, and everyone else coming in to say their piece about YO HOWARD WAS WAY WORSE LAY OFF LOVECRAFT.

It's sort of...projecting, I guess? At least, that's how it feels. It didn't really need to be brought up at all, but people felt the need to do so anyway, which seems oddly telling.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

K Prime posted:

See, I disagree there- there's value and power in struggling against the inevitable. There are a lot of things that can't be changed by one man that nevertheless must be opposed.

Doesn't nChangeling go out of its way to make it clear there are things worth fighting for and beauty to behold, even if there are battles that simply cannot be won? What the fight is also matters - and in Cthulhu stuff, it's usually vast, incomprehensible indifference that could snuff you without a thought, which becomes difficult to work with. (Actually trying to expand it into something that can be fought on some level tends to dilute the appeal, so...)

I was in a campaign which was planned to have similar elements with a dreaming god, but included elements both directly relating to that god and outside of that plot to make it clear there were things that could be won, and the consequences felt real, as did the motivations. Same with my first Mistborn campaign, which ended with my information broker pledging to fight against Ruin however he could, even as he knew he had no chance against a god. Fighting against inevitable odds requires a certain level of stakes and emotional investment that it's hard to justify in the case of Lovecraft-style entities without some serious work.

Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.
I'd like to note, for the record, that the various defenses of Lovecraft in this thread have actually convinced me to entirely avoid his work if at all possible, so you kinda did the opposite of what I'm assuming you were trying to accomplish. So, y'know. There's that!

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Queen Fiona
Jan 8, 2008

Of all evil I deem you capable: therefore I want the good from you. Verily, I have often laughed at the weaklings who thought themselves good because they had no claws.

NachtSieger posted:

I'll definitely try and commit this to memory, it's good advice, thanks.

Not a problem! :h: I'm gonna have to think up good prompts for my own game, actually. I have the world state set up (or rather, previous PCs set it up for me), but not a plot per se beyond a couple of elements - I'm hoping to get good details out of apps, Icon relationships, and prompt answers to get a good narrative going.

Stormgale posted:

Your posting is as good as your choice in nintendo 2nd party based strategy games.

I'd agree with this more if people would stop getting eye-rolly at me about Awakening. :colbert:

TheLovablePlutonis posted:

It inspired this, it's deffo important.



Fsmhunk posted:

But is there room in this world for both?

These covers sum up my whole Lovecraft disinterest thing better than words ever could.

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