oops, marked all as read

also injured my back again...

First!

And once more Jareth('s player) has inflicted a "too complex ruleset" headache...

Couldn't quote the message about perks vs. enhancements vs. limited Luck (thread closed), but as I'm reading it, Stabilizing Skill would (by the time I bought up a suitable skill for each important college) wind up costing more than plain unmodified Luck or even one of the upgraded forms of Luck with shorter cool-down -- and even then it only converts crit fail to ordinary fail.

Increasing skill in spells I use a lot would cost 1 cp per spell (assuming recommended Base Skill 15) to get to the point where only an 18 is a crit, except for Very Hard spells.  Ordinary failures are treated as critical, though, when casting in Very High mana, and there's still that 1/216 chance of something "spectacular" happening.

Yes, I knew this (except those complex and deeply buried compensators) when I built the character.  Part of the fun of this kind of limitation is finding a non-cheaty, world-compatible and in-character way to work around it.  A guy with Bad Vision might work up Blind Fighting and Echolocation and adventure without lights or even get a Darkness amulet; one with No Arms might become a kick boxer (of sorts, there are kicking techniques for a couple of the unarmed fighting skills) or invest in custom made spurs to do cutting damage with kicks (or get blades on his stumps like the X-Men Origins: Wolverine version of Deadpool/Project X).

Best bet might be to seek out a Blessing.  Raise important spell skills to 16 (equivalent to what I've been doing with taking Extra Time), and have a Blessing that modifies rolls by 1, and I should be able to avoid genuine crit fails, and only have to worry about normal fails (=> critical due to Very High mana state) when there's a skill penalty in force (footprint, for instance).

Virgil doesn't have a high IQ?


Or 10 for Magery, or 20 for IQ.  Which is cheap once you've exceeded 10 or 20 spells.  Common Wizard build is 1 exp per spell, making it IQ+Magery-2, -3 if it's one of the few VH spells, and then once you've got "the spells you need/want" just up Magery and IQ to the sky...


Ah, your fun is not my fun.  And I'll note, none of your examples actually overcome the Disadvantage, they allow limited workarounds.  The same as if you just raise spell levels to 16.  Armless kickboxer still can't pick up a package and run, bad sight guy can't read signs down the street, nothing get's around the core of the Disads.  Likewise you'd still suffer crits on a 17+ (because you remove possibility of lower rolls inducing a failure), but you're not overcoming skill failure and critical failure completely.

Which a cheap Luck build would do (even regular Luck does that, kinda).


Bless doesn't work the way you think it does*...  it's because the wording is a holdover and needed an edit for 4e.  Bless does not alter die rolls.  It explicitly cannot mitigate a critical failure or create a critical success.

If you roll an 18, you still rolled an 18 (ditto with rolling a 17, or really any other roll).

As clarified by Kromm (Sean Punch, Line Editor for GURPS):
http://forums.sjgames.com/show...555&postcount=11


I mean, if you can score one, it still raises your skills to get closer to to 16, but it won't mitigate a truly bad roll.


* It didn't work the way I thought it did either, or the way I'd run it for twenty-five years... granted Bless has come up more frequently in this game than in all my previous 25 years of running and playing in GURPS, so maybe if we used it more frequently we'd have sussed out how to properly use it as well (of course we also never applied skill penalties to casters when they healed themselves, and that's been in the rules since 1e... so... maybe my tabletop group would have never just stumbled over the correct way on our own).

Yep, work-arounds, the same way we real people work around our real-world Disadvantages.  My own Bad Sight (Mitigator: Wears Glasses) I've turned into my superpower (Microscopic Vision), using my myopia (and the mental habits of making the most of what I do see, developed since about first grade -- more than half a century) to read model numbers and serial numbers on repair subjects that no one else in the shop can see (I can also read the microprint on a dollar bill with my naked eye, if the light's good).

But yes, my fun is not your fun, "and that's okay," to paraphrase one of the parallels between gaming and the BDSM/fetish lifestyle proponents.  I'd note that increasing Magery in play is, um, relatively difficult from a game mechanics point of view (impossible, in original GURPS canon, without special GM dispensation), and raising IQ is a long wait for any benefit, while increase skill helps the affected spell immediately.  In a game where advancement takes player years, the latter will surely be favored.

Bless.  Hmm.  That interpretation is consistent with the way everything else works in GURPS, but it surely would have been helpful to have that corrected in print at one of the several edition changes.  Not all of us ever even see errata documents, never mind incorporate them in our printed books or memorize them -- and this is a little more game-altering than a typo in the damage for a greatsword.  I think the reason we see Bless a lot in this game is that the boss is still remembering the 3e and older interpretation as well, which for high skill effectively eliminates crit fails.

So I guess I'll need to just start pumping the skill level for spells I'll use regularly, continue taking Extra Time when situation permits (skill 16 makes a 17 NOT a crit, says B382).  That gives 3/216 of "ordinary" failure (=> crit effect due to Very High mana), and perhaps build a small shrine to the dice gods on my desk...  ;)

But in GURPS you're paying for that ability (Acute Vision [?/lvl](Near-Sighted Use Only, ??%)) and reducing the cost of a Disad (Mitigator)...

It's not like you took Discriminatory Touch to get around Blind so you could read without the print being in Braille...  don't @me Daredevil!

(Note, for a Daredevil build it's often recommended to just take Color Blind, as effectively DD isn't blind after all his powers are accounted for... depending on the writer/GM interpretation.)


In DF/RPG "it's super-easy, barely an inconvenience".  Just spend 10 exp, raise Magery.

Note, this game goes back and forth on "how much" it is DF/RPG, it does seem to lean into 'rule of cool', and it isn't "super strict By The RAW" by any stretch*, so if Gwythaint thinks "Luck [5] (Spell Critical Failures Only, -80%)" is cool, then well there you go.

* If it did, you wouldn't have Mana-Enhancer as that's not in DF/RPG, and only one my current Characters would exist, as only one is "by the Template", the others are more (or less) loosely "inspired by the Template".


This is undeniable fact.


It's really not that much of change, it's in interpretation as the Basic book discusses dice rolling, successes, etc.

I mean how else do you reconcile the fact that Bless cannot mitigate or cause criticals if it alters the dice roll?



In Fantasy 1e† I bet it was meant to alter the dice roll (Bless in Fantasy 1e has no wording about criticals)... but then all the rest of the spell's wording was simply carried forward across editions with the addition of "The modification will not affect critical successes and failures."  Indeed in Magic 2e and 3e it reads exactly like Fantasy 1e, with that singular addition.

See for yourself:

GURPS 2e Fantasy 1e:
Bless Regular
  A general spell of aid and protection. It must be cast on another; you cannot bless yourself. In some game worlds, only holy men or “good” wizards can cast this spell; this decision is the GM’s to make.
  The effect of a blessing is as follows: All the subject’s die rolls are modified favorably by one point (or more, for a more powerful blessing). This lasts indefinitely . . . until the subject fails some die roll (or a foe makes a good die roll) and the subject is in some serious danger. Then the blessing miraculously averts or reduces the danger – and ends. It is up to the GM to decide when the blessing has its final effect, and what form the protection takes. If an arrow is aimed at your heart, a 1-point blessing might move it to your arm, while a 2-point one would send it through your hat, and a 3-point one would let it slay a foe behind you.
  Duration: As above.
  Cost: 10 for a 1-point blessing, 50 for a 2-point blessing, 500 for a 3-point blessing. Blessings may not be “stacked” - a stronger blessing dispels a weaker one.
  Time to cast: 1 minute for every point of energy in the spell.
  Prerequisite: Magery 2, and at least 2 spells from each of 10 different colleges. Magery 3 is required to cast a 3-point blessing. A GM may require “holy” or “good” status if he wishes.
  Item: Any. The blessing is cast on the item rather than a person, and affects the wearer of the item. When the blessing finally averts some great danger, the item loses its enchantment. Energy cost to cast: 10 times the cost to cast on a person.

GURPS 3e Magic 2e‡ and GURPS 4e Magic 3e:

Bless            Regular
  A general spell of aid and protection. Must be cast on another; you
cannot bless yourself. In some game-worlds, this spell can be cast only by
holy men or “good” wizards; this decision is the GM’s to make.
  The effect of a blessing is as follows: All the subject’s die-rolls are modified favorably by one point (or more, for a more powerful blessing). The modification will not affect critical successes and failures. This lasts indefinitely . . . until the subject fails some die-roll (or a foe makes a good die-roll) and the subject is in some serious danger. Then the blessing miraculously averts or reduces the danger - and ends. It is up to the GM to decide when the blessing has its final effect, and what form the protection takes. If an arrow is aimed at your heart, a 1 point blessing might move it to your arm, while a 2-point one would send it through your hat, and a 3-point one would let it slay a foe behind you.
  Duration: As above.
  Cost: 10 for a 1-point blessing, 50 for a 2-point blessing, 500 for a 3-point blessing. Blessings may not be “stacked” - a stronger blessing dispels a weaker one.
  Time to cast: 1 minute for every point of energy in the spell.
  Prerequisite: Magery 2, and at least 2 spells from each of 10 different colleges. Magery 3 is required to cast a 3-point blessing. A GM may require “holy” or “good” status if he wishes.
  Item: Any. The blessing is cast on the item rather than a person, and affects the wearer of the item. When the blessing finally averts some great danger, the item loses its enchantment. Energy cost to cast: 10 times the cost to cast on a person.



† Which is for GURPS 2e, sometimes GURPS gives me a headache with it's editioning nonsense.  GURPS Magic 1st (1989) and 2nd (1994) editions are all written for GURPS Basic 3e, while Magic 3e, 2004, is for GURPS 4e Basic, and yes that's a whole fat lot of "WTF?".

‡ I don't have Magic 1e, :( ... but I just bought it.  I didn't realize I didn't actually have it when I picked up Fantasy 1e, or I'd have bought it then.  When I checked my physical copy to compare Bless across all editions, it is also Magic 2e (so I bought a copy of Magic 2e from Warehouse 23 for no reason), so come March 18th, I'll have a copy of every edition of GURPS Magic, and my knowledge of the lore will be complete!  MWAHAHAHAHAHAH!



Everyone complains about D&D going through editions every "5 years", but GURPS 0e, Man to Man, was in 1985, GURPS 1e Basic Set was in '86, 2e Basic Set '87, and 3e was released in '88.  Now, I'll admit, 3e reign for 16 years, and 4e has no revision in sight (we're 18 years in and the only person who mentions 5e, which GURPS needs*, is Kromm and he admits it "would take more money than any sane multimillionaire would want to waste on it and technological inclusion most people are not comfortable with", basically he thinks it needs to be completely online, fully interconnected between books - a singular mega-index - and updatable as needed).


* Okay, it doesn't need 5e, so much as it's need a revisioning of a few things in Ultra-Tech and Basic to bring them in line with Low-Tech's Cost Factors for Equipment modifying, and a proper editing of Magic to actually make it 4e instead of 3e with a slight redressing.  There are reasons I call DFPRG's Spells "Magic 4e".


That's okay, SJG doesn't even bother with making errata anymore, they just make a new print run and annouce "we fixed some stuff, have fun figuring out what!"  Fuckers.  (I'm a little salty about DFRPG's edited second printing because of this.)


Nah... if he's is making that error, like I was before 2018 (yes I can quote when I had that argument with Kromm), he's going all the way back to 2e on this.  The dawn of GURPS Basic Magic.  When gods strode the earth... tv was in black and white, we listened to radio shows, and every school was uphill both ways.


That never hurts.  Sacrifice a fatted calf to RNGesus for all of us.

getting a +1 blessing on a regular would counter individual crit failures at the cost of the spell...

In reply to Narrator (msg # 7):

yo 11 threads is a lot!

You bear it well!

Directional confusion at the bridge near St. Remy (After the Battle)?

River is between Northport and St. Remy, and we came from the same side of the river as St. Remy, did we not?  So guards returning toward that small town, Reanna following guards, and Dilandua following Reanna shouldn't put anyone on the bridge, unless I'm very confused.

In reply to Virgilio Hohlfeld (msg # 10):

sorry, got that wrong, will edit when I get back on.

Who knew dragon men had lips?

You don't get out into Rule 34 territory much do you?

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 13):

they can coceal their teeth, so yes, they can blow a horn. it would be more hensoian/moorcockian/flintstonian to have a loud creature on a stick that they pull the tail of or  eat with a drumstick tho

In reply to Narrator (msg # 14):

busy at work, might be a few days catching up

I didn't think this was that kind of game.

Edit: Wait, did Masugatan just admit he's revolting?
This message was last edited by the player at 22:27, Tue 15 Mar 2022.

Just sayin, there's plenty of evidence that dragonbois and grrls have lips.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 17):

Last I checked, to create a wall of fire you only use Create fire and Shape fire, right?

There is no "Wall of Fire" spell as such.  A large radius Create Fire can have hexes deleted during casting to produce a "wall" up to twice the radius long, or as noted Shape Fire can be used on any fire (natural or magical) to form it into a wall of a size determined by the original fire.

Problem is, Create Fire quickly gets costly at large sizes (radius 5, can produce a wall 10 yards long, costs 10 FP, 9 or 8 with high enough skill -- that's a lot for a wizard who doesn't have a pretty big Power Reserve), and Shape Fire is slow -- Create Fire to produce the original, then cast Shape Fire (though the fire hexes move at 5, as a GM I'd probably require either moving individual hexes at one per turn, or groups moving the same distance and direction, one group per turn -- IOW, it'd take at least 3-4 turns to make a radius 3 created fire into a wall 10 hexes long, and probably an IQ roll or actual player moving hexes on a map to do it in the fewest turns).

*ignite fire 1 14
create fire 1 14
heat 1 14
flaming weapon 1 14*
this is the extent of my fire magic. shape fire hasn't been learned yet.

[Jareth pedantry]
Ah yes, exactly.  I always forget GURPS has no Wall spells...  I also always forget (until I go looking for them) why they have no wall spells* and the many, many, many times I've pitched the idea and heard the chorus of "but the math is so hard to only shave a few FP off the cost, just use Create Fire and exclude the other areas and suck up the cost..." from other GMs and rules tinkerers on the SJG forums.

* Because you can already 'shape' the area of area denial/damage spells.  I keep meaning to sit down and figure out a decent way to do them for the games I GM, but then just never get around to doing it because I remember that would require using geometry and I have a distinct disinclination to involve geometric calculations in my life, despite how often you all see me doing it with spells already.
[/Jareth]



Note also Create Fire creates a fire 6 feet high, so if you want a taller fire you're in "unexplored territory" rules-wise*.  I usually just multiply the spell cost by the doubling, tripling, etc†, of the height a PC wants it to be and call it a day, but at the very high costs (as you note) that Create can get to... that has the repercussion of making that a less used option for most of my Players. m (I've seen it done twice and done it myself a few times, so it's not completely unattractive).


* Like are you allowed to just put another Create Fire above the first to make it 12 feet high?  Many GMs agree you can... but technically you can't and should use another spell to "increase" the size of the fire and then Shape it.

† Like if a PC wnats it to be 12 feet tall it's twice the cost, 9 feet tall it's 1.5 times, etc.  10 feet tall is 1.66 times the cost, always round up.




For Ülo her Fire repertoire is...

But then she is not a combat mage, she's a Utility "Witch" (Wizard/Druid*) with two whole combat skills at 11 (Cloak and Innate Attack (Projectile))... but she has a decent number of 'death dealing" spells, mostly Area Denial/Damage, but also Lightning and Acid Ball... yes, she has the two things needed to keep other trolls in line, acid and fire, and the spells to make them immune to them.

Lightning is in case she needs to get a recalcitrant troll's attention, after it's just mostly pain, the damage will heal within hours... hmmm, now that I think about it, Trolls should be "weak" against burn damage, not just flame (and acid).  Something to ponder for my games.


* Not a whole lot of Druid going on so far though, just to gain access to Esoteric Medicine and Herbalism, and set up for future expansion.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:37, Wed 16 Mar 2022.

Nothing in the rules says the fire shaped had to be flat, even or even horizontal. A 4x3 corridor could have the flame shaped in a single line along the floor, up the walls and across the roof. 4 +4+3+3=14 squares. 14 = pi r 2, r rounds up to 3. R= 2 covers 12 squares, r=3 covers 28 squares (so 2 squares deep all round), rounding down. Cost to cast: 6, cost to maintain: 3. Both can create fire, only one needs to shape it.

Granted, but it does "have to supported" so to speak.  Any part cast "mid-air falls to the ground"*, hence being on "uncertain rulings" with making a Create Fire column taller without using Shape Fire to do it.

And this is why I occasionally think about creating a Wall of Fire spell (as well as Wall of Lightning, Wall of Wind, etc).  Honestly I should just take all the Wall of X spells out of 3e Grimoire and convert them and then create the missing ones.  Hopefully come up with a formula so I can just write "Wall of X, Area, See X spell for damage, duration, etc, change cost to: [Formula]" and call it a day.  So in this case, Wall of Lightning would actually be Wall of Spark Cloud or Spark Storm.


* Which means any hexes cast above the ground would "fall to the ground".
This message was last edited by the player at 21:19, Wed 16 Mar 2022.

I would strongly argue that a ceiling can support fire, and flammable ceilings in house fires regularly do. Mid air would fall to the ground, but a wall or ceiling is not mid-air and should be able to support it. Rock may not feed it, but that is the same issue as on the floor.

You can certainly Ignite a (combustible) ceiling, but as a GM I'd explain that Create Fire is like starting a bonfire without fuel -- where a bonfire could sit, a Created Fire can as well, but where you couldn't lay a small (or large) campfire, you can't put a Created Fire and have it stay.

You can't lay a fire on the ceiling, so Create Fire won't make a fire that stays there.  If the ceiling is wood or wattle or tatami or paper or straw matting (or cellulose ceiling tile made before incorporated retardants), you could use Ignite Fire to set the ceiling on fire (might want to put more than 1 FP into it to get a more vigorous start than the "match equivalent" in order to get it going faster) -- but that's a case where the fuel is self-supporting (at least until it burns a bit), not one where the fire holds itself up.

There is an implied bias in the rules that most Area spells are cast orientated parallel to the ground with their "bottom side" towards the ground.  Remember, GURPS was first a tactical miniatures arena game, not a roleplaying game (though that came very fast on it's heels), so a lot of rules were created with that in mind.  Thus while "wall" and "ceiling" are things the fire from Create Fire will interact with, they are not orientation points for the Create Fire's "bottom", if you follow the implied bias.

This is just my game's rulings I'm theory wonking on though, so while it is based on 35 years of playing, GMing, arguing with other GMs, and rules creators online (only about 25 years of the online bit), it's Gwythaint's game.  If he wants Area spells that can orient onto ceilings (with the fire somehow going 6 feet down?  Or maybe just it's there, "plasma puddling along" the ceiling?), or on a wall with them jetting out 6' (at 3' tall) or being a column "supported on one side by the wall" that's his call.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 26):

Um... Jareth? Wall of Lightning already exist in 4e. On page 197 (or 72, if you use Dungeon Fantasy: Spells).

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 26):

I would drop a no on setting fires to walls and ceiling without fuel to stick it to... you can toss alchemical fire at the ceiling,  but most of it will drip down.

painting the alls/ceiling with it carefully might do the trick...

In reply to Narrator (msg # 28):

Ok. So paint it with oil first, then create fire, and it will stay there as long as the spell is maintained?

Ah good eye.  I always forget about it as no one ever takes it in my games and they always grumble about the lack of "Wall of Fire/Water/Wind/Acid/etc".

I know it's in 3e, in the Grimoire anyway, but keep forgetting they kept it... and upon reviewing 4e Magic it looks like they kept all three Wall spells from 3e Grimoire and added a new one!

This is what comes of having Players that never take those spells, they get lost and forgotten.  So, hmmm... I won't have to reach back to 3e, I can use the current edition and just never get around to doing the math.  Excellent, saving even more time on my laziness!

Missed posting last night, power was out for 3 1/2 hours, came on just in time to set up coffee and go to bed.  Had to pull a UPS (from my 3D printer) to keep circulation in partner's fish tank.

In reply to Ardenas Barehand (msg # 31):

glad the power is back.

There are things that are usually hidden lore or require specific knowledge skills, and not necessarily available via default.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 32):

injured my back at work again.

Ouch!

In reply to Narrator (msg # 33):

Does not sound so good...

In reply to Christine Bjorn (msg # 35):

theysent me home and signed me up for rehab. what I get for moving people above my weight class.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 36):

Good to hear they are looking after you at least.

Or at least trying to avoid an OSHA problem.

Still good...back in my day the sick serfs were just whipped for being lazy...I think in Russia they just conscript them still!

Remember, lift using a younger person's back, not your own.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 40):

possible onboarding of fellow named Denator, likely to pick up someone currently npc'd

In reply to Narrator (msg # 41):

Don't know him...will be good to see a new person! Which thread?
This message was last edited by the player at 23:03, Tue 29 Mar 2022.

Just had a momentary flash of "Leeeeroy Jenkins!"...

One of your characters about to trigger all the hostile mobs in the area?

Nah, just mention of a character name in a thread I don't have a character in.  "Just Leroy."

In reply to Christine Bjorn (msg # 42):

Marcus Blackthotn is being taken by him.

had a rough day a work, might not get to post today

Greetings everybody.

I'll await directions as to how to reenter the scene.

Welcome, anyway.  Hope you enjoy the game.  :)

In reply to Ardenas Barehand (msg # 48):

Marcus has previously fallen off of a roof, and may have been more cautious in his approach to the scene

In reply to Narrator (msg # 49):

move through fire and attack does not get you a shit ton of dodges

In reply to Narrator (msg # 50):

A regular attack allows what is called a 5 ft step, does it not? A small amount of movement? Move and attack is measured in yards, and Gareth had approached slowly...

In reply to Gareth (msg # 51):

and you walked into four attacks with no wahere to dodge, well as the landi g is 4 square yards and the reavers were swinging reach 2 wespons. you advanced between them and had knive thrown from above. if you were retreating,  that was your next rounds action.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 52):

But you discounted retreating, saying I had nowhere to go, so I went with an attack. You said I could not reach initially, so it is not so cramped to stop any ability to dodge, for that it would have to be close combat. Or is there something I am missing?

Unless Gareth took an All Out Attack, kicked while doing a Committed Attack, or made any attack that isn't an "arm" attack¹ while doing a Move and Attack... he can Dodge every attack he is aware of.

Dodge can get very broken with Swashbucklers and Martial Artists when that Dodge score inches up into the low teens, since it doesn't negatively increment with usage (I consider any Dodge above 11 to be entering 'broken' territory personally, but in a DF game, I'd allow it).



1 - Basically as per Martial Arts, if you attack with a hand or hand armed weapon, you can Dodge, if you make an attack that employs any other body parts: foot, head, mouth, butt, knee, groin, etc, you cannot Dodge (this includes slam attacks as that requires your body).

I usually treat Committed Attack the same way, but then I also broadcast that in my House Rules so it's known in advance.




Yes and no.  They are reactions, but whether or not you can Dodge does depend on the Maneuver you take, as noted above, some Maneuvers (plus attack method) preclude Dodge entirely and others penalize it (Committed Attack all allowed defenses are at -2, Do Nothing [Stunned] all defenses are at -4).

Also, Dodge used to be "an abstraction that includes 'passive defensive' movements, not just actively dodging", as that was the old excuse for why you can dodge bullets and lasers in GURPS.  And in Martial Arts, Dodge is described in a few places as being an abstraction that could be "body parrying" in close combat (ie, parrying a grab or other grappling attack by twisting, or interfering with the attempt, but not actually moving from the space).

Close Combat does not preclude Dodging, only Blocking (and it penalyzes non-CC weapons).  Not even being grappled precludes Dodging, you just Dodge at -1 (Parries and Blocks are at -2, or disallowed if that limb is grappled).

Dodge is the superior defense.

Parry is second best.  Block is a barely a defense, excepting that it does stop ranged attacks normal Parries cannot stop, and Block gets the DB bonus all the time (other defenses only get your DB bonus against attacks from the front or shieldside).

Thanks,  Jareth, as usual you said what I was struggling to. (But you were more eloquent

You triggia memory that MA has an optional rule to limit dodges bya cumulative -1 penalty after the first one.

Yeah, I sometimes use that in my games, but only the "combat is a nightmare mode" type games where all the reality toggles are flipped to "gritty" (bleeding, Last Gasp, weapon's can be damaged, shield degradation, Lasting Major Wound Effects, etc).

It's fun, but a different sort of "and every fight is approached with the utmost caution" type of fun.  Not something I'd do for DF, but a Sword and Sandal fantasy (like Conan), sure.

Sometime I'd like to play a game in that mode.  The closest I've come is playing a "modern" setting Hero System -- no "healing" but Hero's Recovery mechanism and the fact that most attacks do mostly Stun, little Body damage, still makes it more cinematic.

Seems like a good mode to play a Delta Green or other horror-based game.  Bring extra character sheets...

Yeah, Delta Green would be perfect for it.*  I like it for Conan because the stories aren't very "high cinematics" (ignoring the movies) where people bleed out and die of infections all the time.


* I could even see it for a GURPS Men In Black, no wait, hear me out.  Yes they are 500-600 point PCs, but that would allow them to still feel like cinematic characters in a super deadly setting, but spinning all the reality dials up to 11 means you could overwhelm a MIB kill team with a simple zombie horde, not just the occasional super beast†.  It would shift the feel from cinematic combat and investigation to gritty-but-survivable combat and investigation...

†  It's really hard to challenge an MIB kill team without slipping into "insta-gib" mode witht he super-tough, super-powerful monsters.  Or by having some goal other than "kill the beast before it kills you/civies/the power plant/etc".

going to try and catch up tomorrow

In reply to Narrator (msg # 60):

The original player of half the junior group is back, and playing Haveron

Glad to be back, after quite a long long time.

In reply to Haveron Stormwal (msg # 62):

Welcome back!

Welcome back indeed.

In reply to Ardenas Barehand (msg # 64):

out of work today with back pain again, may not post until tomorrow

Get well soon

In reply to Haveron Stormwal (msg # 66):

thanks, been filling out Workmans Comp paperwork

Ugh.  I remember that.

"We're going to make you fill out lengthy forms, and then pay you half what you're used to getting."

Huh.  Construction and restaurants must be different than hospitals (and where ever Ardenas worked), HR always filled out all the paperwork (even drove out to my house to have me sign it after reading it at teh fast-food restaurant), and I got paid 2/3rd my weekly (as averaged over the last months).



Though, admittedly when I broke my foot at the steelyards, I did have to "fight" to get it.  HR was all "You're not wearing steeltoe boots, so you aren't covered", so the next day I came in to HR and requested everything I'd signed when I took the job.  30 minutes later I handed the stack back and said, "No where in here does it specify my boots must be steeltoe.  Just that they  must be full leather and come at least two inches above the ankle."†  I always wore recruits (army boots).  HR looked shocked, then read the papers, then sighed and filled out a different set of accident forms, I signed them, and got paid more than my regular hourly (we'd been on mandatory 60+ overtime the last 3 months).

Of course two days later new "uniform requirements" went out that everyone had 1 week to sign and comply with, the only change to the old uniform requirements was "steeltoe boots" for all positions (previously only forklift and crane operators were required them for some reason... and despite having been trained for both positions, and having done both jobs, I was never given that paperwork, because I was hired as a steel bender).  Our plant foreman was ... mildly displeased.  His old requirements were just "boots", not even full leather or above the ankle, so he'd always worn hikers with mesh sides.  He also spent 90% of his day in the air-conditioned office doing paperwork and chasing jobs on the phone, so he really had no room to complain.


† I honestly thought I'd maybe missed it, but as I'd read those requirements with an eye towards "do I have to buy steeltoes?", considering my ginormous feet makes that a very annoying prospect, I was pretty sure steeltoes were never specified.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 69):

That was a fascinating read. Yes, I'm geeky.

Ah, the joys of work place strife.

I honestly think working for an american (presumably) company kind of scares tf out of me.

Not certain, but I presume there's some requirement for the employer to supplement the cost of steel/safety toes (many of them are composite now instead of actual steel) for employees.  Mine, cheap as they are, gives me $85 (used to be $65) every two years to buy safety shoes (seemingly set by the price of the least costly compliant footwear -- my last pair was $145, remainder out of pocket -- and good only at a single shop thirteen miles from our workplace), even though I don't have a forklift certification any more (forklift drivers are the only ones there for whom safety toes are mandatory).

Yeah, I forgot to mention the lengthy interview after an on the job injury (after you're back from the emergency clinic, but before you even go home, never mind miss a day, unless you're in surgery or getting a cast) to try to pin the blame on the employee for failing to follow some one-line codicil in a forty-page employee handbook -- with the potential outcome of firing you for getting hurt on the job.

As I tell my friend in Netherlands every time health care comes up, "This is America.  We're barbarians."

I mean not to make this all "political" or US bashing or whatever - but the healthcare system seems, to me, to be actually insane. Granted, I probably know the bare minimum (being a UKer), but the thought of buying some rural ranch or land in USA is very appealing - the healthcare system is basically what makes it tricky.

That, 2 weeks vacation per year? Please.

please take everything I say with a pinch of salt though, I might just be flat wrong about any of this stuff.

In reply to Haveron Stormwal (msg # 73):
I get a month of vacation. problem is I have now developed a pattern of sick calls due to old injuries- my knee has been acting up four years postop, and this is the fourth time I have injured my back, but I can't see my wc docu til the 3rd...and the i jury was 3/23.

Probably a "State by State" thing, but speaking in Floridian, "Not even a little bit."  I've only had one job that supplied shoes, and since I couldn't use any they supplied (McD's shoe supplier, back when it was corporate*, only had shoes up to 12s), so they had a "yearly pay supplemental".  After 5 years of working there my non-skid (steel-toed†) work boots we're finally giving up the ghost, so I talked the Regional manager into lumping all five years supplemental into one pay-out and replaced my somewhat expensive non-skid (steel-toed) work boots with a new pair (okay, I didn't bother getting steel-toe this time, and the supplementary only covered just over half my boot cost, but I was still happy enough, boots in my size are expensive if they aren't army issue cheap).

No where else I've ever worked has had a "shoe budget", though I've been at several places that supplied "everything but the shoes".  And almost worked at one place that garnished your first paycheck to pay for your uniform, including 15$ for the "Worker's Handbook"!!!  The moment I heard that in training I laughed, said "I quit", and clocked out.  The full 'uniform and other work essentials' fee was around 150$, which was most of a week's training pay.  Since I'd quit before we had to sign that form and receive our uniforms, day 3 of training, I got paid more than those who stayed the whole week of training.


* Back in the day, like 20 years ago, before McD's went pure franchise, back when corporate stores were the main model.  Franchisees don't have to follow those rules, so they don't.  Some even charge for uniforms.

† Yeah, the previously mentioned boots.  I was in a position int he plant where I rarely dinged up my boots, so they were still in great shape when I quit the steelyard (for health reasons) 6 months later.  Those boots lasted me almost 20 years, which is crazy since recruits usually only last me about a year or two, and most shoes are dead within a year.  I'm rough on clothes.


Smells like a pro-Union state... which is good.  I wish all states were pro-Union.  But then we wouldn't have Florida Man and all of Florida's wackiness if that were so.


Mine were never lengthy.  Maybe five minutes.  But at the steelyard, after I had HR argue that I should just butterfly closure my arm when I had a chunk ripped out of it by a wild piece of rebar, yeah, they were 'lengthy' only in that I argued for treatment and made sure to always carefully read their incident reports to make sure nothing was "accidentally" left out.  (I later found out that HR got bonuses based on how many days the the plants went "accident free"... that's never a good thing.)


Honestly, it was only ever the steelyard, which was the penny pinchingest place I'd ever worked, that I had issues.  And man, I've worked some dodgy, fly-by-night seeming places, and those were always the most over-the-top, take care of the injured employee places I've worked.  Like at one place I was threaten with firing if I didn't go to the clinic to have a doctor look at the wound and declare it "properly taken care of, why are you here again?"

Frex, I have a long, long, long (and stupid) history of treating my own injuries (not just because I'm poor, I'm workplace injuries are free hospital visit right? Exactly what a poor person wants, free visit to the doctor, but no rather because i can treat it, and do so faster than a care center or emergency center... usually).  So I have a long history of signing a job accident paper that says, "administered self treatment, went back to work".  Because I'd usually rather be working than sitting in a waiting room for 5 hours because the injury isn't an actual emergency.


Not barbarians, buuuuut... we have a very twisted set of ideals as a nation.  On one hand we're very libertarian "Do it yourself, bootstraps, self-sufficiency, self determination‡", which a socialist medical system would over-ride, but then on the other hand, we have a very greedy, masters versus slave capitalism-run-amok, system of not paying workers enough to "do it themselves".

Like I don't get paid anywhere near enough to afford medical insurance (or put money aside to buy a house, or any of the other things our grandparents and parents could afford - I'm a Gen Xer for those wondering, so when I say 'grandparents' I'm referring to the The Silent Generation, not the Boomers).  Not good insurance anyway, I can afford 'shitty, does jack-all actually' insurance.  So instead I save money in the hopes I never have an emergency**, but I could afford to see a doctor every so often for checkups, etc... if these dang emergencies would stop happening.


** So yes, Trump erasing the ACA "it's not actually a tax" Penalty from our tax returns was one of the few things I thought he did right.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 74):

Ah man, I feel for you... that's pretty rough

Ah, that's where we left it.  Jeez, you'd think with something so large we wouldn't misplace it so easily... Hey Mario, the Hobs found our bhole!

That makes Military Retirement seem pretty good indeed, at least in my day; I gather things are not as good now.

Tricare for life is definitely worth serving four years in the military these days.  Almost, almost makes me wish I weren't too old to give four to old Uncle Sam...

Except it takes 20, not 4 years. But in combination with Medicare, our out of pocket expenses are rare and small. My wife had minor back surgery to replace her TENS unit and our portion of the whole bill is $17.

Whereas I have "very good" insurance (medical providers keep telling me): they pay not a penny until $750 deductible is met, which barring need for an expensive procedure (two doctor visits and medical eye exam per year, retinal exam every other year, and seven prescriptions) is usually about the first of December.  After that, they pay 80% until I'm out of pocket another $1250.  And AFTER THAT they pay 100% until next January 1 and the count starts all over again (unless I exceed their annual or lifetime benefit limits -- which latter already includes a hundred grand or so for my heart surgery in 2014).

Had double lithotripsy last September; after all insurance, I got a bill from the Stone Center (not even counting radiology and the doctor's fee, which I'd already shelled out a couple hundred for before hitting my out of pocket limit -- they were "last" but their billing was quicker) for $1400+.  Made a payment arrangement and I'll be paying on that until late 2023.

I'm as libertarian as the next guy, but even I'm starting to think our capitalism has run amok just about long enough.  Honestly, I've wondered whether humans as a species are competent to manage their own affairs.

In reply to Oly (msg # 80):

A friend of mine had cancer.  Surgery, recovery and chemo cost less than $1000

Ah, what is it just VA after four years?  My buddy only did four and he goes to the VA for basically everything.

WARNING -- CRUNCHY RULES TALK AHEAD -- WARNING

Depending a few factors; the Hyena spearweilder's ST, if they are heavy spears or magical or not, the swinginess of die rolls and crits... this could either be a sticker bush Jednesa is wading into or a brutal bloodbath for not just the hyenas, but herself.

There is a very thin margin where the spears will do small amounts of damage after DR (like 4-8 injury), and then very large gulfs on either side that are nothing or a whole lot (that is the nature of impaling damage though, it could be nothing or it could be insanely brutal).

If the Hyenafolk have a ST of 15-16 and they're wielding heavy spears*, or 17-18 with normal spears, it's that sweet spot of "she gets damaged, but not too much", below this and I have no fears for Jednesa (baring those wild crits, or an errant eyeshot), ST 19+ and she's waded into hell...†


* In this case they're rolling 1d+7 or +8, averaging 10 or 11 damage, which against Jednesa is minimal (DR 10), best case (for them) at ST 15 + heavy spear + her maximum Move, is 1d+9 for an average 12.5, so call 2-3 damage average which is 4-6 after impaling.  Now we're talking "wear her down" damage (pretty quickly too).  ST 17 + hvy spear + max Move is 1d+10, now we're looking at 3.5 damage, that's getting close to easy 'swing' into 15 injury after impaling and Jednesa is making immediate HT rolls versus Major Wounds (knockdown, Stun).  Also more than one of those and she's making unconsciousness checks.  Of course she's also likely to go berserk and get a +1 to those rolls...

† ST 19 is 2d+7.  Now the 'swing' is greater, 9 to 19, but the average is 14 (and rolling 2 dice makes the average more likely), so it's going to be a lot "bloody hits" for 8 injury after impaling, and probably one or two big ones that will be more worrisome.


And that's not even looking at magic, or poisons, or anything else.  Just ST + spear + Stop Hit damage versus Jednesa's Thick Skin DR.

Huh? DR10!?!

For a wood elf that inhabites a TL 9 world, what weapon might most suitably replace his ancestral (aka racial) expertise with a bow?

Just a pistol? Or is there actually something in official GURPS like Chewie's bocaster?

Probably a gun, i'd suppose.

TY Haveron.

On a different topic, if a wizard is required to learn 90% of a spell college before proceeding to another college which colllege would one choose to start with? And, more importantly, why?

Thanks folks!

functionally the best college is "meta" because iot gives so much utility and stuff to other spells.
but maybe thats the best 2nd choice.


My favourite Elemental college is Air because it has a lot of function, and Concussion which is the best missile spell.

For "carnage and death" fire is a no brainer, two of the first spells can wreck havoc on people.

However, my absolute first pics in almost all situations is for "augmenting" stuff he can already do, usually this means Mind (just supremely powerful in any society, even if not very cinematic), or body (because most of my characters can fight).  I feel that these really capture the "I'm a powerful wizard, don't mess with me" vibe more than throwing big balls of fire at people and constantly missing.

It really matters what kind of wizard you want to be though, but I always keep this in mind:

In reply to Haveron Stormwal (msg # 89):

That makes sense. I've not really looked at Mind before.
Fire, fine, tried that before. I liked the the look of Air, but thought Body seemed underwhelming. I guess I'm missing soemthing there/not looking at it the right way.

Would your advice change if it were in a TL9 world (where you can have TL9 pistols)?

Body in a lot of cases is underwhelming. It's hard to be a fighter, fighting against other fighters and then smashing them with "stun". IF you have one of these things at high level though (15+) and you have meta (hold spell) you can really really dominate combat encounters.

I know it's not about power gaming, but i kinda like figuring out how to add things together to make a whole greater than the sum of its parts.

Rooted feet, Stun, choke, and a bunch of others you can utilise spells against different attributes (DX/Ht/ST) to deal with anyone.

Appraoch someone, with a held stun spell. start fighting him, stun him as a free action (speak a command word on a held spell) and then smash him to pieces. Easy win.

Similary, for me it really benefits the 'concept' too and helps to justify some more cinematic advantages such as "natural DR", natural weapon enhancements, super leap, enhanced move, and all these other things that make a fighter really cool. Plus, it's probably the most direct path to being immortal.

I've been playing a lot of supportcharacters lately and wanted my (next) wizard to not be too squishy.

In reply to Haveron Stormwal (msg # 91):

Necro has death vision, which is almost an insta stun, movement and protection can get you missile shield, retyrn missiles and energy shield...


these heyena men are strung but not viciously so, but they aren't stupid


and they aren't very lucky either...

max damage was 9, the crit was normal damage...
This message was last edited by the GM at 12:48, Fri 08 Apr 2022.

Yea, Death vision is basically the most OP spell in the game - no saving roll from what i recall and just insta-stuns. Though in many cases it's quite hard to justify if youre not a necromancer. However, you could argue it being in college of mind too, so +1 for mind.

So, meta magic is your friend here. You can make a pretty good mage with 'some decent' fight skill and then use meta magic to hold a bunch of spells that will up your fighting ability to new levels.

Thing, great haste, flying, reflect missiles, shield, or something.

Haste + Shield for example, would make a ST:10 DX12: IQ:X HT: 10 fighter with main weapons kill of 15 to be kind of badass. Maybe add some targeted attack


Spear 15, targeted attack (neck)
Great Haste


These three things alone will make you pretty capable of smashing anyone one on one.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 93):

oooh forgot the set damage! Jednesa gets... irritated

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 83):

Yes, VA is available after 4... actually 3 years I think or a Medical discharge.

Yeah, Jednesa is rhinohiding, to steal an SCA phrase... it might sound extreme (and outside of DF I'd be lookin askance myself) but in DF Barbarians can get up to DR 7*/9* Tough Skin/Tough Skin Crushing Only, and Ogres can get up to DR 3, and it all stacks for a whooping DR 10*/12*.

Dwarves [and Half-Ogres] (up to DR 2 Tough Skin) and Half-Spirits (varies) are the second toughest, and Dwarven Barbarians can easily be the tankiest with DR 4/6 Tough Skin/TS Crushing plus wearing armor!  Standard Barbarians in DF have Gigantism which makes armor more expensive, frex JEdnesa is SM +2, so armor and weapons for her cost and weigh 5 times regular price and weight, which is mostly where her SM is a drawback.

* That includes "DR 5 Tough Skin, Cannot Stack With Armor" from the Shirtless Savage Barbarian lens, which Jednesa has.  Which is why she so frequently suffers Sartorial Destruction... (the Odious Personal Habit "Underdressed Savage" comes from the lens)

[EDIT]
Forgot Half-Ogres who also can get up to DR 2 Tough Skin.
[/EDIT]




Depends on the genre theme...  Over The Top Action?  Just keep the bow and pick up Heroic Archer... Gritty Wainscot Fantasy?  Pack a pistol, and weep for the lost benes from your racial package.

But then if it's the later, why are Elves getting a racial bonus if they aren't expected to use bows?


As above, depends on the genre theme.  For Wainscot Fantasy I like going Mind Control or Knowledge as they are subtle spells, but if it's meant to be more like Dresden Files (Modern Action Fantasy), then going with flashier, more direct damage "action" spells would be fine.

Note, in a modern context, there is also the Technology College and Illusions can be especially potent in a subtle campaign.





Wheh!  This is a lot less worrisome, okay, commence Operation: Stomp The Thorn Bush.  The dragonfolk and everyone else can handle the other half of the Hyenas...  Jednesa and Masugatan have this side wrapped up.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:04, Fri 08 Apr 2022.

be away for the weekend

FWIW, I really like Heroic Archer stacked with Weapon Master (Bow).

Yeah, it's 40 cp, but the ability to fire every second (unless I blow a Fast Draw roll), and use the bow's Acc without taking time to aim means that 40 plus the high DX you'd expect for an archer, a pretty modest number of points in actual Bow skill and Fast Draw (Arrow) make me a TL3-4 machine gun -- and I can still be a reasonably competent burglar, have useful skill in a couple backup weapons, and be genuinely deadly against single opponents (heavy armor?  It's still got eye slits, which allows targeting eyes with more than 90% chance of a hit inside ten yards or so).

Too bad Cornucopia quivers are so expensive now.  Even Clint Barton runs out of arrows...

Re: Trading with Trolls 3.

What is the parties distance from the worm?  Are we close enough for Grohm (Move 6) to close and get a melee attack (Reach2) in before it disappears into the hole?

In reply to Grohm'Tahl (msg # 101):

the gap between the outer wall (where you are)and the inner wall of the tower in the shaft is 3 yards. the worm is two yards wide, so, yes, you can strike at it, just make a ht+2 roll,plus racial bonus vs hazards

In reply to Narrator (msg # 102):

"Are we more familiar now?

In reply to Astral Reaver (msg # 103):

Marcus will be afc on vacay fro 4/19-4/25

Sigh.  Time to head for work, so couldn't get through all the threads.  Closed the browser, then came back to post "be back this afternoon/evening" and found all the threads marked as read...  :I

This is why I just leave them open, or if I have to shut down the compy/browser for some reason*, I copypasta the link into a notepad and note the last msg#.

But yes, RPoL's way of deciding "Oh, they logged in and read one thread out of 20, I'll just be helpful and mark them all read" is a bit annoying sometimes.

i'm bowing out.
adios, muchachos!

I could have left the browser open (at the cost of a few work units of MilkyWay@Home) -- if I'd remembered RPoL does this...  :/

Sorry to see you go. RL in the way? What other characters do you have?

In reply to Christine Bjorn (msg # 109):

they play Chye Isuel,  the Yurick family. and Grimaldi


if they are in fact leaving, there needs be some restructuring.
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:13, Wed 20 Apr 2022.

Pretty sure I've read "avulse" before, but had never been sure what it means.

Now I'm grossed out a little...

It's always great having a GM well versed in the medical field...

So say we all.

Marcus, the thread you're looking for is "New in Town" -- it's on the second page of threads (maybe the third if you have large browser text or a small screen).

Thanks

What is the Hadereum?
If Marcus would even know that...
This message was last edited by the player at 12:16, Sun 24 Apr 2022.

If Marcus is a resident of Northport (not a newby fresh off the boat like Benny is), then he'd know the Hadereum is the church/bureaucracy that 'runs' the town.  If I'm recalling correctly the Church of Hades was the largest singular organization left after the plague some 40(?) years back and so they filled the void left by the nobility and the Guild system.  The Nobles and the Guilds are still there, and have a bit of a come back lately, but the Hadereum is still on top (or maybe they were always on top in Northport?  Have to admit I've been not doing political characters so I've kinda avoided digging too deeply).

Any, Church of Hades, bureaucrats, big into people not being able to avoid either death or taxes... strong believer in "you serve your entire sentence even if you die" (hence the occasional punished zombie you'll see in the city square outside their cathedral).

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 117):

the Cathedral belongs to the Triunist church, the Hadereum looks more like Haggia Sofia if it was a tenth of the size and buried up to the base of the domes.

while the cathedral is between redilght. dockside, and artisinal, the Hadereum is at the edge of dockside and temple hill

Ah, now I wonder if 'The Dome' (which is how I'ma gonna refer to the Hadereum in the future) has an under-basilica down in the sewers or not.  And which temple sits at the top most position of the hill?  The Temple of Janus?

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 119):

the empty temple of jove

By Jove!

I always mistake Janus for Jove for some reason.

Two rolls on a spell: Thaumaturgy and what else? I hate when my mind decides to play hide and seek with things I should know....

What are you trying to do?

Learning new spells from earned credit points

In reply to Ales Konstantin (msg # 124):

I cast the spell, and roll teaching, you roll thaumatology anything goes wrong on my end, you learn something warped

Indeed -- that's how I learned Sticky Missile.

Last trip out to the rice village, I was able to teach Ming-Sa Light, Continual Light, and Lend Energy, but I'm not certain that's applicable between PCs (potential for abuse?).

If permitted, I'm willing to give a try via the same method -- if I know the spell you want to learn, of course.

In reply to Chou-Zhen Mou (msg # 126):

going to be sparse today, and after Saturday the 30th I will be afc on vacay until Monday the 9th

Nice!  Enjoy the time away from your employers/abusers.

In reply to Ardenas Barehand (msg # 128):

He is a wage slave who loves his job, right chummer? :)

Page 197 of The You You Are, by Ricken Hale, "Your so-called boss may own the clock that taunts you from the wall, but, my friends, the hour is yours."

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 130):

the job is fine, it is the unscheduled ot that derives from insufficient staffing that sucks.

Grohm'Tahl is looking to add a character to against the baron, he could pick up Shroud in the black tower 2 as well...

I believe we would welcome the help in our task.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 131):

Let me get caught up on my second party before you volunteer me for another one please.

In reply to Grohm'Tahl (msg # 133):

sorry just giving you options

It's all good.

In reply to Grohm'Tahl (msg # 135):

alright all enjoy the week!

Blargle... I have only 1TB free of my 9TB harddrives (2 2.25TB internals and a 4.5TB external).  I could delete some of those tv shows I've been piling up, I keep meaning to getting around to watching... or the movies... I could probably free up a couple hundred gigs if I cleaned up the redundant albums in my music partition... I could take a serious trimmer to my books files, I know there are some authors I will never read.  But it's books ya know?

Or I could say "sod it all" and buy another 4.5TB external and move files over...  I think I know what I'll be doing.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 137):

You should specialise, 1 HDD for movies, one for books and one for music...

By their nature, though, books take up relatively little space -- my first book reader, fifteen years ago, could store thousands of book .pdf files in a device I could carry around easily and that would run a week or more on a charge.  Music players take more storage than that, but still not that much -- a good rule of thumb is 1 MB per minute for compressed "CD quality" music (though lossless will generally be bigger).

Movies, on the other hand, run to multiple gigabytes even when stored at minimum HD resolution...

Yeah, I mean I've only got 8-900 gigs worth of books (pdfs, epubs, and offline webpages)... that's not even quite, almost is though, a quarter of the big external drive...


I'd honestly cry if those hd's all died on me.  That's over twenty years of accumulating digital books alone, not to mention the music... the music of which a lot thos cds are long dead (I used to take them to work at construction sites, concrete dust does a number on cds)...  the 29 gigs of game notes (notes, pics, and a bunch of duplicate rpg pdfs), some of which are scanned copies of old game notes from the "Before Times"...

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 140):

having a little trouble keeping up

My recommendation? (and I'm serious, so hear me out)

Make a list of all the threads you are running games in.  All like 10 of 'em (actually make it 13†, include "OOC", "Awards and development", and "leavetaking"*)

Everyday take the topmost unchecked thread on the list, open and scroll back to the last place you posted in a thread, read to the end, decide if you need to update it, and if so update it.  Then check it off the list, updated or no‡.

If you didn't need to update it, maybe make a note so if you come back to it in a week, you can ask if people are waiting on something (we all miss posts occasionally) or just move it along yourself.

If you have time, do the next thread on the list, if not, start with that one the next day.  If you thought you had time, but upon reading it decide you do not, make notes on what is going on but do not check it off then come back to it the next day (only check off a thread if you've updated it, or decided it doesn't need to updated).

This way, day by day you'll move threads along (or decide they don't yet need to be moved along).  Instead of waiting till you have time to binge and purge all the threads, or worse only the ones that are updating and thus missing threads and posts, just handle one (or more) per day in this way.

If you have to skip a day, skip a day.  But don't try to tackle all the threads at once unless you have the whole dang [TIME UNIT] free for doing that, for you I figure this is about 4-6 hours of time... I know that's probably what it would take me if all 10 mission threads were hopping.

I do this when all my games here on RPoL are popping and I don't have time for them all.  And I use the list because of the "new messages" bug that shows or doesn't show new messages being all messed sometimes for me (and shows new messages when there are no new messages, stupid bug).


If you prefer checking via mobile on lunch at work, then use a moleskin of equivalent for your "List" and notes, or whatever works for you.  But work your way down, one (or so) game(s) per day (or so).  Little steady increments, instead of trying to mass update all at once.


† These three threads?  I'd probably check them everyday regardless, and then if I had time, do another thread. (I mean okay, you can see by the "last post date" that "leavetaking" hasn't gotten new messages in a long time, but still, a quick check doesn't hurt, then just move to the next thread.  It's just a good habit to develop.)

‡  You can even pop a note into the thread, "Read to this point, update not needed - here are my notes: [NOTES]" as a GM thread with Private to GM lines (for your notes), or edited into the last Player post in the thread.

This way you'll always know where you left off, what is going on, etc.  (The Orange GM Private line, especially if you can bold it (I know mobile makes formatting sketchy) is very easy to spot when scrolling up to see where you left off.)
This message was last edited by the player at 18:13, Thu 12 May 2022.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 142):

Or just start combining groups to reduce the threads, with folk allowed multiple characters per thread.

Time for Christine to teach Chris Jugga?

I wouldn't have any objection to combining threads, though in that case I'd probably pick a couple characters to "go off on other adventures" for a while, or just settle in with a job and salary and apartment until/unless needed.  Even though I'm playing only my own builds, some of my characters are more interesting (to roleplay) than others, and none of them are particularly combat-optimized...

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 142):

this is essentially what I do, checking to see if I or an npc made the last post, and go fifo.

Side Note:  I updated the "Armor and Enchantments" post to be "Armor, Power Items, and Enchantments" because it was annoying me it wasn't as "one stop" as it could be.  I'll further update with the rest of the Enchantment costs in the future as I also just noticed it's missing all the Casting Item, One Use Items, and other costs.

link to a message in this game

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 146):

may be onboarding a part djin to Deathtrap

In reply to Narrator (msg # 147):

"I am a legacy npc,formerly a 100pt 3e pc from Playbyweb in the earlist incarnation of this game, from 2002"
This message was last edited by the player at 20:03, Wed 18 May 2022.

In reply to Dagon (msg # 148):

I may have trouble catching up over the next several days. definitely on Saturday at some point, but things are hectic right now

No Problems... we have all been there.

Jareth, I don't think that link you posted goes to the post you updated...

Yeah, I don't know why but sometimes the "link directly to a post" thing doesn't work and it goes to the last post in the thread (I thought it was just a "me thing" because I'm still on Win7 using an outdated Chrome browser... but if it's failing for you as well, then it's a systemic bug).  It's post #98 though.

Hello! New here, excited to join in. Ihsan is a young man with djinni ancestry and a blessing of Air, who wants to help people with his healing magic.

Welcome aboard!

A healer, always a useful adventurer to have around, good choice!

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 155):

Primarily healer, a bit of support (some armor and speed buffs), a good amount of utility themed around air (flying, purifying air, etc).

In reply to Ihsan (msg # 156):

Well met. Do you know elvish?

In reply to Anita Drake (msg # 157):

No, I just have the basic language mentioned in one of the pinned posts.

In reply to Ihsan (msg # 158):

hopefully  catching up tomorrow

Hmm.  I think this might be the last time I build a character to use a whip (at least as a primary weapon).

The special rules are scattered all over the place (two different locations in the Campaigns book as well as the primary spot in Melee Weapons in Characters -- haven't even looked at them in Low Tech recently), so it's easy to miss stuff like the 0.5 armor modifier (armor has double DR for whip attacks?), two turns to ready for whips longer than 3 yards, tiny damage, and -4 skill for either weapon entangling or "crack" attacks (inability to attack at reach 1 for a long whip I did account for in the sisters' tactics).

Best I can figure, Indiana Jones must have had a whip skill above 20 by the time he got his professorship; maybe higher than that, based on the stuff he was able to do with little apparent effort.  And those demonstrations you've seen with a 4 or 5 or 6 yard bullwhip being able to crack once a second or flip back to ready in almost no time were obviously by folks who haven't read the rules...

Meanwhile, the sisters may be looking to learn Quarterstaff or Axe/Mace next time they get some experience...

There a a pair of Techniques that can cheaply help out with both of those usage skill penalties (cheaper than raising Whip by +4 anyway).


Yeah, whips are kinda meh in the really real world... which unfortunately is reflected in the rules.  If you want Ethnic Cool versions of the weapons, you might talk Gwythaint into allowing a "Whip Master" Advantage that would remove some of those disads, or just try to sweet talk him into ignoring some of the reality... after all this is a game about elves where "a wizard did it" is a perfectly cromulent excuse.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 161):

Get something that allows a shield. The bonus to defence for a priest is pretty important!

Low Tech doesn't offer anything special, except to divide whips into Whip and Light Whip (the latter pretty much the type you'd use on livestock, as an attention getter and authority reminder like an e-collar on a dog, the former intended for punishment or extra painful harm).  We already have the standard version (considered both "weighted" and "studded" says Low Tech 64).  You must be referring to something in Martial Arts, which I don't have (but apparently, should get around fifteen years ago).



Even that isn't going to change the tiny damage and double DR for armor.  Part of Indy's advantage was that almost no one wore anything heavier than khakis in his milieu, not to mention he mostly used his whip as a trick/stunt item; seldom as a weapon (lacks both the reach and the punch of a heavy revolver).



Both sisters have shields and use them with the whips (one-handed weapon, no reason not to).  Only the younger one has Shield skill above default (point shortage, as usual).  The player, however, isn't that familiar with the game mechanics of shields after the changes from 3e (used to have Passive Defense that worked against any attack, now PD doesn't exist, for instance).  Another thing I need to dig in, I guess.6y7ttttt99999999999999999999999999999999999

That's what "Ethnic Cool" means, for example, "Katanas can chop through tanks", so in games where that is true Katanas get +1 damage and DR divisor.  In this case, you might talk Gwythaint into allowing you to ignore the Armor multiplier, which is incredibly harsh, but (realistic) so even DR heavy leather doesn't render enemies immune to your whips... and to ignore the -4 to entangling and cracking as that's the primary use of whips in the media depicted... it would make Whips "Ethnic Cool" (or "Media Cool" in this case, but be warned, it means whips are just as 'cool' when wielded by enemies).


You add the DB to all defenses if the attack is from the shield side while the shield is being wielded.

Frex, if your shield skill is 10, that's a Block Defense of 8 ("half Skill +3", like all other defenses in 4e).  If you're using a small shield (DB +1) your Block is a 9 (after DB bonus which always applies to the Block defense), medium shield has a DB of +2, so Block of 11, large shield is DB +3, so 12.

It's one of the reasons people think Block is the best defense, it's very easy to raise for very little point investment. (Dodge is the best defense, but it's the hardest to raise above 10, and even hitting 10 is difficult on a tight point budget, but easy peasy for 250 points†, and if you get Dodge up the 12-14 range it's golden).


† If you prioritize for it.  Of my five 250 point characters (Jareth is only a 125er), only 2 have a Dodge above 9 (two have an 8, one has a 9), Dilandua at 11 (when not wearing armor, 10 in their leathers) and Jednesa at 10 (even carrying all her gear).  But they both prioritized Basic Speed to some degree (Dilandua more so, aiming at Dodge 12 with them eventually), even though for Jednesa defense isn't really her thing...  (all those All Out Attacks are coming home to roost now though - but I have plans to get around that later, just needed a reason for her Patron to worry about it)


Cat on keyboard?

I think I'd prefer (in this case) to play this as "bought and practiced the whips after seeing one of those traveling trickesters, found out they're almost worthless in the real world, looked for something that works better and still won't break the bank."

  Yep, B374, DB 1 for small shield (which the sisters have), cloak, and improvised shields like a stool, DB 2 for medium, and DB 3 for for large shields.  Unfortunately, didn't help Evelina's dodge (which was still better than her block on default).



Or in this case, Shield 14 gives block of 14/2+3 = 10, + 1 DB.



There's always Enhanced Dodge -- had a character in one of my games years ago who pushed everything trying to be as nearly impossible to hit as possible, bought (IIRC) two levels of Enhanced Dodge (that was 3e, though, haven't looked at that one in 4e) on top of pushing Basic Speed as far as practical.

Generally, though, Shield has the advantage of being relatively easy to improve over time.




No, but I've been having browser crashes recently, that might have been caused by one.

much to my dismay Chye/Grimaldi/Leroy/Yurick family took his characters with him when he left so that they cannot be properly npc'd.  That sucks
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:49, Wed 01 June 2022.

Yeah, so just kill them off. Remove the names from the characters and it's history.
BUT IF YOU COULD get Azrael off my character list, it would help me a lot!
The others I can play when appropriate.

In reply to Oly (msg # 167):

Sounds like some PC culling is due. Should we gather them into a party of 'expendables', and any PC in that party is fair game for the GM?

I'd rather see them "off screen" until or unless they're needed again.  After all, NPCs who run afoul of player groups and wind up crippled often have alternative jobs at the Guild or arranged by them.

That stunt with Chye/Grimaldi seems a little cheap.  No backup copies of the RPoL sheets?

In reply to Ardenas Barehand (msg # 169):

i might be able to dig them out of PM's but I need some time in front of a PC that I won't have for a while

Just in case you didn't see it  Gwythaint.

From GURPS COMMUNITY LOUNGE Variations on Wierdness Magnet

https://www.ravensnpennies.com...s-magnet-variations/

Oly, that link seems to have gotten a little bent.  My browser can't follow it.

Sorry, try this:   https://www.ravensnpennies.com...s-magnet-variations/

Better.

As I mentioned in the Community Lounge, I'm more partial to Charles Seager's house rules on Weirdness Magnet (as a GM.  As a Player I still consider it "free" points, but whatever floats the GM's boat is fine with me).

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 175):

I have not been assessing the reaction penaltyas I should,  at least not since Shevnia  when Marlena got blamed for the Bard Stringfellow speaking legend into being...
I use it for Spellcasting, and for some prolonged situations like the Ymid hanging out with 4 of them... Ludlow certainly was getting the reaction penalty, as has Gui Ma,but making encounters include more prefixes should work...

goi g to be out and about with the wife until Monday

Good Plan, have fun...

Don't those apply only to those who know (or at least have reason to suspect) that a character is a Weirdness Magnet and what that is?  B161, though perhaps this too was changed for DF/DFRPG...

DF/RPG doesn't do "Frequency of Occurrence" rolls for Ads/Disads (which is why Enemy, Reputation, and a small list of other traits are removed in DF/RPG).

Weirdness Magnet in DFRPG specifically calls out a Reaction Penalty as so:  "Anyone with spellcasting ability can sense this trait! Wizards’ Guild members, temple priests, and similar NPCs will consider you a liability and react to you at ‑2."

Further the DFRPG variant makes sure to point out the Disad is meant to inconvenience the Weirdness Magnet PC, not grant carte blanche to kill them.


Personally, it's a -15 point Disad^[1], those have a tendency to "kill or seriously inconvenience" PCs, so in my home games (my House Rules) it's a -2 Reaction Penalty^[2] with 'Spellcasters', Merchants, and everyone else in any place you've been longer than 1 week.  Inversely, it's a +2 Reaction Mod with any 'weirdness' creature and grants them a +4 to find you as you always count as "obvious" to them.  Lastly, on a roll of 1 on 1d it adds a prefix* to the Wandering Damage Chart roll that's just shown up to "harm" the group, and the prefix bearing WDC result will target the PC in question first if possible (if the result isn't an individually targetable result, such ye olde "Rocks Fall, everyone makes a Dodge or Block roll or takes X damage" I might reroll once to see if I can't find a singular targetable result).

But if I give the group the option to outlaw the Disad, as (just as with ye olde Enemy^[2]) it has a tendency to impact the group as much as the PC in question.


1 Compared to say, Berserk or One /Eye/Hand.

2 in my house rules, individual Reaction Bonuses/Penalties count towards any group rolls (total all applicable Bonuses and Penalties and divide by number of N/PCs in group), such as "selling loot". looking for work, hiring Allies/Hirelings/etc, and of course, any group Reaction Rolls.  This has had some odd game results, like every PC taking only negative Reaction modifying Disads, no Ads, becuase (as one Player put it) "Fuck it, everyone else has penalties, why bother trying to counter that?".  It's also resulted in everyone tryign to 'balance' themselves out or end up positive as best they can.

I tend to do this in PC making myself, like both Jareth and Jednesa have positives and negatives, Jareth has Attractive and Voice to help compensate for his Weirdness Magnet and later acquired Social Stigma (Excommunicated), where Jednesa has Honesty, Truthfulness, and Sense of Duty (Adventuring Companions) to coutner the fact that she's a Hideous Monster (Social Stigma) with an Odious Personal Habit (Shirtless Savage).  Stenet and Dilandua have very few penalties, but also very few bonuses, while Benny is mostly all bonus (but he's a Face so, that makes sense) and Ulo is nothing but a big pile of negatives.  But that's what her crappy Diplomancy skill is there for, hail mary rolls.

3 And the way I handle Enemy now is when it trigger for the session, every encounter thereafter (that makes any sense with) has a trigger chance (same as the Disad) until Enemy occurs.  If triggered that encounter targets the Enemy PC and one of the creatures is "prefixed" with 'Enemy', which just makes it a little buffer, if it is a non-combat encounter, then one of the creatures (or the group) will simply refuse to react positively towards the PC (or PC's group).  Your Enemy has some how 'hired' these creatures to make your day suck a little more†.

If I'm not running a DF/RPG game, then the noncombat NPCs will likely become reoccurring problems to be solved'.  In a DF/RPG game, it's a one-off, and future encounters have the same chances to being penalized or not (your Enemy has been bad mouthing you around town and it was just a momentary consequence).

This also depends kinda on the Enemy as the Player has described them.  For instance a Clockpunk Gnome Artificer Enemy would beef up traps instead of beefing up monsters, a Wizard Enemy might have boosted them with single use potions or magical effects, a local Nobleman is more likely to impact "social' encounters (they wouldn't exactly be hiring 'monsters'), a local Brigand would increase the likelihood of being waylaid returning from the dungeon, etc.

But as with Weirdness Magnet above, Enemy is on the very short list of Disads (which is just Enemy and Weirdness Magnet) that the group can outlaw during Session Zero, as these Disads tend to impact the group as much as just the one PC.  I've altered Wealth in my games so it doesn't impact the group and only impacts the PC who takes it (at least in DF/RPG and other such games where Wealth operates under different rules).

I do have at least 1 enemy, remnants of an evil twinand, what, 6 or seven different weirdness magnets... and I continually have fun with that evil twin, though she might not be alive any more...
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:38, Fri 03 June 2022.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 181):

I actually have to admit, the evil twin is something I should have taken for Gareth! He is fun as it is, so an evil version of him would really cloud the issue!

It is fun for Christine though, you have done well with that. Maybe need another mountain elf everyone mistakes for her...

Well, you do have to admit that Weirdness Magnet is entirely reasonable for me...

I always forget about Evil Twin because it didn't survive the move to 4e (as it was, it's now just a flavor of Enemy and that is on my list) and the book it was originally from hasn't graced my gaming table in almost 25 years.

Granted, now that I do Enemy differently, Gwythaint's Evil Twin style is very much how I roll Enemy for DF/RPG, they exist in the background to give the PC negative Reaction penalties for things the 'Evil' Twin has done...




Same for Jareth despite my reluctance to initially take it.  Very much has shaped how he's been growing...

Possibly of interest to some here...

https://imgur.com/a/oSqXOuZ

https://watabou.github.io/city-generator/

I love how "Northtown" is clearly south of Gatetown, thus making Gatetown the northenmost 'town'... that's evidence of advanced city planning there (and exactly what happens in real life all the time).


Which reminds me, this one has been making the rounds again, but it's still funny.

This somehow got smaller when it was saved, but if you look close enough or magnify a bit,you can see an old city wall; Northtown was the northern part of the city once, but then Gatetown grew up outside the wall from the gates out along the roads.  BTW, drinking water from the river without magical purification isn't recommended -- the mines (and their tailings) are upstream a few miles.

Also notice Dawnreach on the western side of the city?  It's on a hill (Spring Hill on the other side of the wall), so it's the first part that dawn reaches (can't see the hill on this flat map).

I love this city generator, except that it gives no way to save a city in progress and come back to it later.  Exports can't be re-imported, most are just glorified screenshots.  Anyone know of a city generator (even a paid one, if the price is reasonable) that will let me tweak things as I learn my way around the software, zoom in on small areas, but still not have the draw the whole thing myself (which will never happen for a city of 40,000+ -- and I need four or five more a little smaller, plus the usual complement of smaller cities, towns of various sizes, and the ability to throw together a village, hamlet, or thorp on short notice)?

Oh yeah, it looks [nifty]*, it's definitely got some shortcomings though (no hills or elevation?  Come on generator) but nothing an export or screen grab and a few minutes with an editor can't fix.

The biggest flaw is it doesn't seem to like putting a river running right through the city "center", which... ah... I'll admit is one of those fetishes of mine.  I love me a fantasy/medieval city bisected by a river.

Like, I were the cartographer for Northport, there'd be a river running through it, maybe not through it's center (I think that's a hill), but along the hill's base?  Oh yeah...  but who knows, maybe there is one, it's just under ground now.

Which reminds of one of my favorite cities I created once, originally had a river running through it into the bay, but as it was heavily downslope from the nearby hills, the rich and powerful (deemed the River Lords) long ago had an aqueduct system built to control the water's flow and deprive the masses of 'free' water... made for some very interesting power dynamics and difficulties when Fae and Spirits of the Bay and the Uplands finally stirred to investigate why the salmon were no more, and where had their River Spirit cousins disappeared to.


* Editted - what even would "mifty" mean?  SOunds like "cool but also angers you".
This message was last edited by the player at 14:54, Sun 05 June 2022.

Problem is, it won't make the city or exports any bigger than what fits on my screen, and by the time I've got several thousand buildings the details get too small to see or edit (buildings 2-3 pixels across).  Exporting as .svg might help that, but I'll have to install and relearn Inkscape...



The developer states in one of the places this is available (itch.io, where there's more room to comment than on github -- the github version, however, doesn't run in a frame so the exports are bigger) that the goal wasn't historical accuracy, but making nice looking cities.



Sounds like London from the 17th through 20th centuries.  There's a movement now to "free the streams" and restore the dozens of minor tributaries to the Thames that have been running in what amount to sewer tunnels for the past (up to) three hundred years to being surface streams, with associated wetlands -- good luck getting that done in the dense core of one of the world's biggest cities.

Now I'm trying to think of bisected cities.  Paris was on both banks even in medieval times, Budapest was originally two cities, but London was mostly on the north bank (still is, for that matter), most of Rome (5 or 6 of the hills?) is east of the Tiber, Athens doesn't even have a river (it's a seaport, of course), Moscow is 2/3 on the north side (probably almost all on that side in pre-Tsar times).  Prague is about 2/3 east of the river, and its "Old Town" is on the east, with "Lesser Town" on the west.  Hard to be sure from a modern map (at least three impoundment lakes now), but Berlin seems to be at a confluence.  Kolkata is almost all on one side, and Mumbai doesn't have a significant river (another seaport).  Ho Chi Minh City (nee Saigon) is about 2/3, and the part to the east of the river looks like marshy delta land.

In terms of looking more or less like a real city, I think the generator comes out doing a good job...

From a "growing up from a lucky village" standpoint, Budapest has the most likely scenario for a city that's nearly equal on both sides of a river: two cities that joined (or partially joined, I've read that Buda and Pest are still in part separately governed) after they'd grown and developed enough commerce to have multiple major bridges.

Now that is a problem.  I hadn't tried export yet as I'd had no reason to.  Does it zoom in and out?  (can't be arsed to go check)


The dev and I have a mild disagreement on what makes "nice looking" cities.  I love the look of a city that is smack up against the river or has one running through it, and after reloading like fifty cities the closest I got was "walled city near the river with the outskirts spilling to and across the river".  But then I really didn't play with the options too much, other than note that my favorite looking option always removed trees, which is another strike for me (but yeah, it's useful for quickie little town maps - but I'm not sure when I'd ever really need that).


I'm not sure where my preference for the look of cities on water* (seaports, rivers mushed up against or running through), but I do know that having the city split by a river (or inlet waterways), or two or three, makes for some dynamic chase scenes, and if the genre supports it, I also love "Bridgetowns", that is little boroughs that spring up on long bridges, buildings shops, and homes built right on the bridge.

Not so much these, http://anewtraveller.com/2018/...s-inhabited-bridges/ (though the Thames Tower Bridge is a right there on what I like), but like this (except you know, mid-city):
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/9e/3...ting-inspiration.jpg

Stuff kinda also inspired by Gibson's Bridge Trilogy.


* Which no doubt played a large part of why I liked Zomboat (british zombie apocalypse where the heroines take a channel boat as their "escape vessel/mobile home"), though admittedly the "zombie apocalypse", "b-camp", and "british humour played straigthness" of the series were big helps.  Only had one season which is a bit disheartening, but it was still a fun romp.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:19, Sun 05 June 2022.

Okay, went to look at the one linked above on Imgur, and found that it actually exports at much higher than screen resolution -- that one's above 15 megapixels if you right click and "view image" which is quite adequate once you view it at full size.



FWIW, that one has the wall actually crossing the river and there's the whole Riverton district (outside the wall) -- I'd call that at least as "against the river" as any seaport is likely to be.  I'm certain the "Warp" option will let you move stuff around, to the point of expanding a district that's across the river, or rerouting city wall (if present), adjusting roads (not sure if you can move the river or reshape the coast line, though).



Yep, like the Tower Bridge was before the last-but-one rebuild.  In Pepys's day, the Bridge was a city in its own right.

There are good practical reasons why cities don't often naturally grow up on both sides of a major river, cost of building adequate bridges being at the top of the list.  Generally, either there were two small cities first, or the city didn't start to spill over the river until at least one very broad bridge exists.  And let's not forget that sturdy bridges that don't block ship traffic are a higher minimum tech level than a city (for instance, the inhabitants of Mohenjo-Daro or Ur couldn't have built a bridge even like the many-arched one the Romans put across the Rhine -- they simply didn't know how).

BTW, I added a village (~350 population, mostly company town near a couple mines) to the link above; it shows the problem with trying to tag too many things in the town (legend covers 1/4 of the map).  And no, there's no zoom feature in the software.  I think it was originally created to be a "quick, I need a map!" solution rather than a serious campaign design tool -- which is sad, because it works better than free-trial Worldographer, which is intended as a campaign design tool (albeit working with the old hex-map paradigm).

Everything I've found so far that's any better than those two is either vaporware or pretty manual, or both -- they give you lots of assets, but you have to manually place them, so it's no better than designing a city in Inkscape or similar, even after you have all the shapes built.  And expensive...

Yeah, the Orichalcum map was pretty much what I was trying to do, but like I said, I think having a castle was screwing with getting it to do what I wanted...

So I went and opened the page again and it immediately did what I wanted.  F-ing RNGesus, just lives to fuck with me.  i swear some days...
https://watabou.github.io/city...river=1&gates=-1


Yup, I love the old Tower Bridge.  I used to have a map of it, spent an hour last night trawling my harddrives... i think it was lost in the crash of 08.  Shame.

That's why I occasionally burn stuff to disk nowadays.  But then my game folder has bloated... the 'first world problem' of having a few 5 terabyte harddrives, you stop carefully curating stuff and just "toss it on the pile" to be sorted through later.  For all I know I do have the Tower Bridge maps on these hds, just, yanno, buried under the cruft.


Oh, I know.  but realism and historicity be damned when I'm getting my fantasy fetishes on...

My current fantasy world has a city that was risen up on fairly "extreme hills" (cataclysmic earth reshapement), split almost 'down the middle' with cliffs, and has a river running through it to waterfall of the cliff's 'corner' (so yes, it's slowly been eroding and increasing the depth of the cliff's penetration into the city).  And no, the river doesn't run uphill, the city now butts up against a small moutnian range which didn't exist pre-cataclysm.

So, yes, I like to get my extreme world building hat on, which is why I don't even blink an eye at things like "megadungeon city under a city".  Once I've stepped into 'wizard did it" territory, I stop worrying about the big stuff like that (it's the small stuff I still question, which Gwythaint likes to delve into much to my delight).


Just have export two version, one with, one without the Legend.  And then maybe try to add your own legend in post-editting.


I still just do mine by hand and then scan them.  But then I did take architecture and drafting in school... which was pointless as I free hand everything anyway (not totally pointless, architecture at least gave me some insight into building design and layout - drafting was pointless since I don't own the tools used in that process and would only use them if I were building a Roman town layout).

Yeah, but I was hoping I wouldn't have to do much of that.  Cropping to square is annoying, too -- one version had the outlying tags on the eastern and western roads almost fall out of the exported frame.



eBay can get you a basic drafting tool set like my dad's (from his college in '58-'62) that I used in college in '78 (Mechanical Drawing was a required course in the Engineering disciplines then, with all the profs rhapsodizing about the wonders of the coming CAD revolution).  Pretty sure I still remember how to do a four-center ellipse, general format for a title block, etc. even though it's been more than forty years.  A drafting table, maybe not so much, and the "drafting machines" (not the ones in The Door Into Summer, the ones that were like an angle guide and T-square combined on a pantograph arm) are probably all broken and gone by now.

Even hand sketching requires a flat, smooth surface to get a good result, not to mention good pencils (which seem to be on their last legs, economically, along with their support tools like lead pointers).  CAD software is the way to go, except it's got a steeper learning curve than those mechanical tools did forty to a hundred years ago.  Long ago, I used to use GeoDraw (an app that came with GeoWorks Ensemble, the last version of GEOS-PC -- 386 oriented, maximum expected RAM 8MB), and from more recent experience I've found that OpenOffice Draw has pretty much the same workflow and tool set -- but manually placing, never mind actually drawing (to create the assets) thousands of houses is not my idea of a fun way to build a campaign city.  Before I do that, I'll handwave the whole thing and draw up a dozen or so "important" buildings (city government, major merchants, some inns and taverns and private homes) as I've done in the past.

will be catching up Sunday

In reply to Narrator (msg # 194):

I just realized that the trading with trolls crew were never awarded points,so fo a two year thread they get a double helping.

You just gave out 6 exp* to us in the Awards thread in April, so is this a "take 4 more so you're at 10 exp" bump?
link to a message in this game


As well as 1 point way back in May of '20 (which was two years ago - but that's all the exp we've gotten for this mission to date).
link to a message in this game

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 196):

yes take 4

Wasn't until I was calculating the results of my own Push that I noticed this...  O.o

Sounds like he asked for Ogre levels of Strength.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 199):

catching on!

Congrats to our GM who has been herding cats for 70K posts.  That's a long grind and a feat little seen here on RPOL.

yes, nice work! TY!

Question:-

Elves have their own language.  Do fairy's have one too?

In reply to Grohm'Tahl (msg # 201):

Indeed. Congratulations on the milestone!

Or worse, some package that includes that.  Guess we'll find out before long...

In reply to Rosewood (msg # 203):

a lot of fey creatures also speak elven, but many speak Sylvan, kind of a common tongue for pixies, brownies, leprechauns, dryads, centaurs, and fauns

Sorry to everyone I'm in threads with, the last couple of days (weeks actually) have been extra terrible, somehow pulled my lower back on Friday and I've been in agony every day since (except Saturday, where I was able to move with minimal pain and made the mistake of thinking I could mow the lawn without reprecussions).

I'm going to try to get myself caught up in all the threads today (yes, that means calculating the final loot in After the Battle too).

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 207):

feel better!

In reply to Narrator (msg # 208):

Nasty, pray you will get well soon.

taking Rosewood background languages are some thing he be into.  I would take it that he need to put points into each one.  We can sort out why he does not have them at moment later.  Not a problem.  Just as long as player I understand what you need to do have ability to read and write a languages then I can fix this over time.

In reply to Rosewood (msg # 210):

I think some of this may have been answered, but I am looking for one of the following options to purchase:

Fine, balanced Heavy cloak (I anticipate this would be a well tailored and weighted cloak for defence) $750, 3.75 lbs, +1 to cloak skill.

ST:11 balanced composite crossbow, worth $4750.

Replace her Medium Leather Vest ($158) get Fine Light Thieves Mail ($6,825, torso only, 3/1). Elven would cost $8,100, and would need more cash. Current cash $6647, so anticipate a little more coming.

Or a Very fine, balanced Silver coated Long knife, worth $3120, plus a balanced ST:11 crossbow, worth $750

Be well, Jareth.

In reply to Dne Utrotare (msg # 212):

Do the trolls need a sneaky character to add to the party?

In reply to Reanna Draegan (msg # 211):

how about the cloak and the knife, as you have the money

In reply to Narrator (msg # 214):

catching up tomorrow work has been nuts

In reply to Narrator (msg # 214):

I have money for cloak, balanced crossbow and knife actually. But the armour may be better for survivability.

Well, this is going to suck.

At least nobody will call me Lefty.

But I bet I won't have to worry about rolling for Lasting or Permanent crippling...
This message was last edited by the player at 23:16, Tue 21 June 2022.

In reply to Ardenas Barehand (msg # 217):

we just lost a player over an insensitive comment in Deathtrap which has since been removed. We don't go into that topic here at all.

OMG!  Bro, that's two cripples under your belt.  Lol.

Jednesa came this >< close to joining you in the "One (good) leg, one hand, one eye" club, I just got lucky, and then triply lucky that it'll heal in month on her own.  Of course she was pressing her luck considering the Blessing had literally, just seconds before, saved her eye from that exact same fate... but then she's not the sharpest tool in the shed.


Personally, I recommend letting the comment stay in thread with a warning attached in post.  Otherwise no one else can learn from their mistake (I mean no one who didn't see the message before it was edited anyway).

(( But then I'm a borderline personality and like things to be very obvious for my ease of convenience.  So if it was truly hurtful, and others aren't up to it standing, I can accept it's removal. ))

I had rough but not evil character lay down their minimum standards for decency, and it was answered with a r*pe joke. We do not make SA comments here.
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:05, Thu 23 June 2022.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 220):

I am a little confused. Was something I said interpreted as a rape joke? That is not something I joke about, so I am a bit perplexed.

In reply to Anita Drake (msg # 221):

yes it was perceived that way.
[private to Anita Drake: the barkeep warned against letting the fellas do something nonconseentual and you responded that "the bitch would like that" that is making light of Sexual Assault]
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:03, Thu 23 June 2022.

Unlike Mario, though (who'll be back to normal in around three more weeks game time -- or sometime in 2024-2025 time frame), this is going to require Regeneration (and "One try" seems ominous...) -- or just working around big penalties on Climbing, possibly some Judo uses (likely not much on Karate, though, as the stump can still be used for unarmed parries after healing).  Maybe I'll get a claw and practice up Knife skill...

The parry was my first impulse there, after that crit success against the vial of Alchemical Fire -- but even in hindsight it was the right move.  The same hit on the torso (same DR, but without the blow-through limit) would have left Ardenas at -1 HP and potentially bleeding out, vs. not really out of the fight now that he's shaken off the initial stun.

Understood.


It is.  But, by DFRPG rules, if the "Church" does it, they don't roll, you just pay out the nose.

But even so, you've got options.  Does Ardenas have Martial Artist Regeneration?  I'm pretty sure there's an option to add Regrowth to it, maybe to represent him having massaged his chakras and gotten in touch with his inner ayurveda.

110% with you there.


We're talking Real Life minorities and religious groups though, right?

Can Intolerant/Chauvanistic Characters still talk stupid about in game minorities and oppressed folk (goblins, orcs, trolls, them damnable fae, the poor, and the ever present and perfect Master Race, the elves) as well as raz on priests and others who have the "wrong" religious thoughts?

Never heard of MA Regeneration.  Did I mention I built this martial artist seven years (or about five weeks) ago, without having (even now) ever seen a copy of GURPS Martial Arts?  And DFRPG is much newer than that, and I don't have a copy of that, either.  I didn't even understand Techniques back then (still not completely sure I do, but I get what they're aimed at -- buying off skill penalties for unusual maneuvers).

Pretty sure a couple dozen francs isn't going to cover "out the nose" costs...

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 225):

Playin chauvinism and intolerance vs fictional peoples is gamesble, but keep in mind there are rw fiths represented.

Sorry but I can't figure this onne out...   " rw fiths"

Could be a typo.

"real world faiths", perhaps.

In reply to Grohm'Tahl (msg # 229):

yes, real world faiths. I was cribbing from Banestorm when I started this game.




we have to do better. I have to do better

OK, Now I follow, Thanks you both for the clarification.

Real world faiths (current or historical) that I know to be represented here:

Christianity (as Triunist)
Hinduism (Thuggees, likely followers of other Hindu gods)
Multiple branches of Greco-Roman pantheism (Hadereum, Hermes, Ares, probably others)
Buddhism (practiced in at least one dojo in Northport)
Chinese and Japanese folk religion (one name for it is "ba")
Islam (more or less, in Al Menir)

I believe we've met one follower of Judaism.

The Old Religion of Europe (Horned God, Goddess, Wild Hunt, etc.) is represented by some of the Faerie with their Summer and Winter (or Seelie and Unseelie) Courts.

I'm probably missing some.  Creating religions from scratch is MUCH harder than borrowing from real ones; even the ones Gwythaint didn't introduce individually (i.e. dragged in with the Banestorm elements) were mostly borrowed from the real world.

Okay, I've yielded; just ordered a fresh soft cover print copy (I prefer paper for reference works; I find it hard to deal with multiple open PDFs on screen) of the current Martial Arts (not the "GURPS Classic" one for 3rd Ed.).  Clearly should have done this years ago, maybe even when I was running my Whiteharbor (though that was 3E, I'd have had to buy it again) or first version Broken Empire campaigns...

Warehouse 23 links to Amazon to buy print copies, which means I'll have it Sunday.

Would that i could have sent you mine, I have little use for it, it seems.

It's in DF/DFRPG... also in Basic, just there it's called "Regeneration, Regular [23] (Requires Chi Talent, -10%)"  (okay, you got me, Basic doesn't mention the "Requires Chi Talent" part)

Of course having looked it up (to make it was Regular and not Slow), I notice it doesn't have Regrowth, so you'd still be ups shit's creek with only paddle.  ;)

But fear not, once combat is over, Benny might be able to restore your hand.  Okay, he can always pray for a miracle, but I mean that teh wording of Lay on Hands (Benny's 'heal other people' Prayer) is slightly different than the wording of the base ability Healing, and I doubt it was an error.



Yeah and I told ya like 5 years ago you really should pick it up, it's a great resource.  Glad you finally saw the light.... unfortunately Martial Artist's Regeneration ability isn't in there. (but Techniques and Combos are, and those are useful)


Noooooo... not even close.  Tyr, ah... carry the epsilon... like 800 francs.  If a Franc is "twenty bucks, same as in town".

According to the index Warehouse 23 makes available, it's on MA47.  Maybe it wasn't in 3e Martial Arts?



Yep, same francs we use, twenty bits per.  Eight hundred, huh.  That's not happening soon.  Yep, might have to see an artificer.  Well, when things calm down a bit, we'll see what Benny can come up with before worrying too much about big bags of coin.

So it is!  I sometimes forget everything that's in that section of the book, I mostly hit it for Techniques, Skills, Optional COmabt Rules, and Weapons... and not even weapons anymore now that I have my own Weapon List documents.


That we will. Either he'll be able to restore your missing hand (and likely temporarily cripple his own using Lay on Hands) or he'll have to try for a Real Miracle™ and directly ask Hermes to "find this stalwart warrior's hand and restore it's path" (or something, Benny is still making this stuff up as he goes along).

I, ah, I roped myself into Co-GMing a GURPS 4e Fallout 4 survival horror game...  that is a "survival horror" GURPS 4e game based on the world of Fallout 4.

Come check it out if you're into Survival Horror as we're leaning harder into "survival" and "horror" than the video games series gets up to.
link to another game

I might have to look at that survival horror game.  I've never played any of the Fallout games (I've seen a fraction of an hour of gameplay for one of them, don't even recall which), but overall I like the idea of survival horror in a game setting.

Edit: Hmm, I see a lot of talents called out in the character templates, but no idea where to find them -- GCS doesn't have (for instance) Academic listed (I have "Talent" as a build-your-own, but nothing that says what Talent: Academic is good for).  Did I not read far enough in the long, long, character section?

Edit 2: Never mind, found 'em.

Edit 3: Okay, just about enough time for the moment spent over there (making a template for GCS).  I see a few things at the bottom of the "Genius" template that don't show in GCS, probably need to dig down to the bottom of the character section.  I'll send a request over there so I can get really started on chargen...
This message was last edited by the player at 13:30, Sun 26 June 2022.

The horses are aiming their bows at the bear??! What kind of horses are we talking about here?

Horses that like to be the center of attention, perhaps?

In reply to Hannatti (msg # 241):

the merry men!

uuuhhh I missed that. Was intended as a joke: Horse with a bow = center (centaur) of attention

In reply to Hannatti (msg # 243):

Lol, these jokes are hard to bear. They tend to make me grizzly...

Ha!

I'm making myself horse laughing...

OH no, Jednesa almost have enough to buy Combat Reflexes, Jednesa hope not have to buy Ally Group (Gnolls) instead....

In reply to Jednesa (msg # 247):

Noting the situation with the trolls, are they splitting into 2 and needing an extra member or two?

In reply to Tommy (msg # 248):

quite possibly.

has anyone heard from Jendrich?

Now I'm wondering OOC about Malga'Mar.  Last I remember seeing a post from him was near the end of the pay train recovery with Kirpich and Syvanus -- did he come back to Northport with them, or head off to sea with that sailor fellow?

In reply to Virgilio Hohlfeld (msg # 250):

the player headed off midway through  the Abbey adventure, he was one of a few characters that had Latin skills and i liked the build
This message was last edited by the GM at 17:38, Tue 05 July 2022.

In reply to Tommy (msg # 248):

Perhaps not, i think some of us just want to come up for air and spend a few points/some cash.

I'll note that Jareth knows all the languages (at Accented at least)... but hasn't been back to the Guild House in about a week.  Not that Reanna (who's been gone a week) or Virgilio (who doesn't know him) would know this.

Just mentioning in case you guys start asking around the Guild house, someone might remember Jareth is the "ex-sage who's been bumming around here since The Dismal Tower kicked him out for not paying dues".

*SIGH*

Jednesa did not want to adopt pack of gnolls.  But Jednesa do what Jednesa must.  Maybe someday Jednesa have whole massive army of 'monster' peoples and Jednesa have Great Army again...

Rafik is an expensive date... on the other hand, just have to pay for him once...


(Why do half of my PCs have Allies?  What the hell is this?  I don't normally buy Allies!  I mean for Jareth and Ulo it makes sense, they are squishy...  At least Stenet will never buy an Ally and Dilandua doesn't care.  Benny can't afford to woo Kalima away from Mancini...)

In reply to Ulo (msg # 255):

Yeah, I find allies can be good for carrying stuff too. And healing. Since I like making up characters, I can add in a necromantic healer...or an undead killing healer, is someone needs one.

As a fellow GM and as a Player I tend to dislike them.

As a GM because it's one more NPC I have to deal with, as a Player because it's probably stepping on a fellow PC's role and it just means more enemies are going to be plunked down by the GM to make up for us having more bodies.  And when they die, that's points thrown down a hole.

I tend to not allow Allies when I GM.  Now Hirelings?  That's a whole nother drain on the PC's funds, so they're a-okay.  And Hirelings tend to suck, and I'll kill them off without a second thought.

In reply to Jareth Mooncalled (msg # 257):

me I love the hench.


back on Sunday

Benny better not dare try to woo Kalima away. Not only would it make a certain leprechaun angry, but I might just start take an interest in all the wonders of Hermes....

In reply to Mancini (msg # 259):

trying so hard with the gardens of summer...

In reply to Narrator (msg # 260):

i pm'd a group in the Black Tower, let me know if I should have used a semicolon instead of a comma.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 261):

I did not recieve a PM from you, Narrator.
Nor can I see a msg that looks like it may have been intended as a PM.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 261):

I did not rccieve any PM either.

In reply to Adept Yisslitheniss (msg # 263):

Nor did I, but I suspect I was not meant to.
This message was last updated by the player at 21:55, Sun 10 July 2022.

In reply to Hograth Podkarmen (msg # 264):

Especially since you are in the Gardens of Summer and not the Black Tower...

In reply to Adept Yisslitheniss (msg # 265):

Master of many faces, I am!

Sometimes it's better to give up and not try to force things...  ;)

Ah, but trying to do what?

In reply to Hograth Podkarmen (msg # 268):

black tower folks check the posting again.


without stating it directly
sometimes things are blatantly obvious to me, but seem utterly obfuscated to others.
part of this involves taking advice from unreliable sources, and rhen not questioning the reasons for that advice in terms of the directive that the PC's are operating under.

Ahem.  No worries, I'll state it indirectly:

Hograth, why would the fish have warned us away from the Well?
Because the Well is dangerous.

Why would the Well be dangerous?
Because there is something dangerous in it.

What are we hunting?
Dangerous things.

In reply to Stenet Fjall (msg # 270):

I see. I was assuming if the fish knew about it though, it must be a local, or not new or demonic danger.

But perhaps worth checking...

Got the in-thread PM. I had no inkling that was so.

Jednesa very tempted to type "snackrifice to great dragon", but Jednesa not punishing people today...

In reply to Jednesa (msg # 273):

be catching up tomorrow

In reply to Narrator (msg # 274):

be catching up after the weekend, threw out my bavck again

Nasty! Poor you! Hope it straightens out real soon

In reply to Narrator (msg # 275):

That does not sound fun. Wishing you a quick recovery.

Just ran across this on YouTube.  Remember that "scold's bridle" that was part of the sky iron manacle set?

https://youtu.be/uAUjekSZ7-k

In reply to Narrator (msg # 275):

Well go get it back, you'll need it.
Hopefully it fits back in as it should and becomes comfortable... I assume you use a back brace at work and when working?

In reply to Virgilio Hohlfeld (msg # 278):

I just got a better back brace.  the one I was using was no good.

The scold's bridle I had seen on a PBS mystery of so.e kind, and I had in mind Clive Barker's lord of illusions, where the master magician was freed by his disciples from a similar rig that had blocked his spellcasting.

I thought the second run of Trading With The Trolls was getting started the next morning?  Has it been sped up?

Nice.  I've been envisioning the effect of sky iron as roughly similar to the Sigil of Darkness from Barbara Hambly's Windrose Chronicles -- when made as a seal in lead, it's a "blank spot" in the mana around, and physically painful by close proximity to a mage.

In reply to Ulo (msg # 281):

I assume that the thread starts the next morning since that was when we were instructed to meet.

It's not "painful", it's just a 'dead sopt' and area you don't feel Mana from, and if in a No Mana Zone, you are cut off from Mana and thus magic.  It might feel strange, like no longer having a hand, or missing your ears, a "sense" is gone and a means of manipulating the world is gone.  A mage cut off from Mana long enough might get Phantom Magery Sensations...

Which is probably often misdiagnosed as a delusion of some kind...

In reply to Virgilio Hohlfeld (msg # 285):

it is like entering a soundproofed room, or picking a regular toothbrush up when yu are used to holding electric ones.


trading with trolls 4 starts the next morning; Ulo has some business to attend to first,and there was the matter of getting scrolls translated.

In reply to Narrator (msg # 286):

Yes, Reanna is not necessarily going to go with them...she may have her own deal depending on the content of the scrolls. But they were looking for a ranking guild member, so it seemed appropriate to poke my nose in.

Are we creating another group with the Trolls? They seem to be splitting...
This message was last edited by the player at 20:48, Mon 25 July 2022.

In reply to Reanna Draegan (msg # 287):

the secondary troll group happens before the loadout to trade

Apologies for absence.
Swapped/Drowning in work :/

In reply to Marcus Blackthorn (msg # 289):

be catching up probably Monday, chasing around with the wife

In reply to Narrator (msg # 290):

Ulo can post in Trading with Trolls 4

the issues the tavern group face are because of the departure of the Yurick family's player.

OK, So no quick resolution of the issue?
Just carry on to the Eastern reaches and back?

Can we get someone up here to investigate and push their case?

Mancini would be glad to help out... for a cut.