Topics

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General Chaos / Getting closer

« on: October 21, 2011, 02:05:04 PM »

http://bcove.me/w6ghy6dn

Science fiction is starting to scare me. People seem to actually be getting inspired by it and creating things that will take over the world.

I know Ross is on-board for our robot overlords...

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General Chaos / Top Ten Movies

« on: August 23, 2010, 01:18:01 AM »

Lay out your top ten and why.

Don't try to impress anyone with some art-class bullshit either (I'm looking at anyone who is going to say Citizen Kane... it's not about the top ten movies ever made and how they advanced cinema etc. Just what you actually have seen at least a few times because you wanted to - not because you had to). Hopefully this will show some movies we wouldn't normally think to watch. Or we will discover that we all have roughly the same fucked up taste.

Don't worry about putting them in order - just pick your favourite 10.

1) Star Wars - I credit it with turning me on to sci-fi
2) Army of Darkness - B movies can be awesome too - see my quote
3) Dead Poets Society - Robin Williams can act... holy shit, never saw that coming
4) Conan - I credit this with introducing me to fantasy
5) Equilibrium - I must like it... I have watched it at least 9 times "Have you taken your dose?"
6) Weird Science - I saw this a ton of times when I was a kid, and it was a perfect example of the 80's
7) Porkys - boobs. "Why do they call you Meat?"
The Fifth Element - just a fun movie that I watch a lot "Moultipass."
9) Leon - Gary Oldman, Jean Reno, Natalie Portman - twisted awesome "No women, no kids."
10) Commando - mindless action with great one-liners "Where's Sully?"

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General Chaos / Heh heh

« on: August 17, 2010, 11:57:03 PM »

Aim for the bushes.

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General Chaos / Happy Star Wars day

« on: May 04, 2010, 10:52:02 AM »

May the Fourth be with you.

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RPGs / Stuff...

« on: April 23, 2010, 12:06:58 PM »

So there is a great thread about puzzles and non-combat encounters, and I didn't want to try and hijack it with combat stuff, but what sort of cool things can you do to weave a good combat encounter with a puzzle component to it? Like a curious trap or something. And what about the outcome? Interesting treasure and such.

Example
It was for an Eberron game and they were students of a famous adventurer who was teaching at the university in Sharn. He had a 'teaching-dungeon' where he would run students through a variety of encounters. In this particular one, the students had to go through and acquire a collection of items that would be worth something. He was teaching appraisal skills and acquisition skills.

They were set up with a few encounters where there were guardians of the treasure, or the guardians were what appeared to be the treasure. There was art all over the place etc. They were being taught that some treasure is harder to handle than others. Some guardians triggered when they moved treasure away from them and essentially tried to take it back from the players (think statues animating etc. that went after the PC holding the item).

They got to one point where they had the treasure, and they had set up to attack what they thought was the guardian. So when the moved away, I had the paintings animate instead of the statue... it worked pretty well, despite being cheap...


And sometimes the treasure is the monster. How do you capture a rust monster? A typical cage sure isn't going to work, and if you don't have sufficient magic to create some sort of force contraption, what do you do? Just think about how all of those mad wizards get the monster guardians in their dungeons in the first place.


I have also given my PC's their treasure in silver pieces. 50 coins equals 1 lb. I'm sure you can come up with some interesting math for that... (and you would be surprised how little a bag of holding can hold when filled with coins...)

And don't forget to factor in the weight of the container when carrying treasure!

And over-sized treasure. A dazzling tapestry that is 40 feet wide and 30 feet tall, made for a castle and worth a fortune (over 10k gp) - you can't just fold that sucker up and stuff it in a sack, and it is worth enough that the players won't want to leave it behind.

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RPGs / Uses for an immovable rod

« on: April 05, 2010, 04:26:18 PM »

1) If you get swallowed whole, activate the rod before trying to get yourself out.

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General Chaos / I'm sure some of you can find a use for this.

« on: February 04, 2010, 05:08:26 PM »

http://www.thinkgeek.com/geektoys/collectibles/d2cd/

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RPGs / Old Campaign - thought I would share

« on: January 18, 2010, 04:17:59 PM »

http://www.gaminggeek.ca/riatavin/2005/10/22/chapter-1/

This is a series of notes, written in a nicer format, that describes a 5 year campaign. It is more verbose in the beginning and tapers off. We accomplished a large arc, but ran out of steam after that.

Still, it was some of the best gaming I have ever had the pleasure of playing.

I'm sure someone can find some fodder in here for their own game.

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RPGs / My Gripe with 4th Ed.

« on: January 07, 2010, 03:33:28 PM »

Yes, Ross, I know you love it.

Yes, there are things I like about it.

Yes, I do play 4th Ed.

I actually play 4th Ed. more than anything else. I run a Pathfinder game about once a month, and played 3rd and 3.5 for years. I also played 2nd. And 1st. And GURPS, Palladium spin-offs, Champions, etc. etc.

It just really bugs me that when I want to actually challenge players with something other than a fight or social situation, I have to basically use athletics or acrobatics as the catch-all.

Can't they just add one or two more skills to cover role-playing interests? The groups I play with like to have their characters have other talents (such as blacksmith, sailor, cook etc.) and there is just no real mechanism for measuring their talent in that area. If you say your character is the best blacksmith in the land, how could anyone challenge you? There is no measure of ability.

It also bugs me how un-special wizards are now. It does feel like the public school system now - no one is more special than anyone else... bleh.

Anyway, there is my little rant.

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RPGs / Worst PC death

« on: August 05, 2009, 04:33:29 PM »

Man, I sure am spending a lot time on this forum today... it's a good thing I don't have a ton of work to get done... oops.

What is the worst way a PC (your's or someone else's) has died?

My worst one was when a character I had been playing for 6 years and truly loved playing more than any other in all of my years was killed in the cheapest way ever: in their sleep by a basically random encounter.

This character of mine was not powerful. She was not the most effective at anything other than causing trouble and having really high knowledge checks (and I'm sorry, if I get a 37 on my knowledge check, I want to know what that demon has for breakfast on a Tuesday in June, not just that it is called a Retriever). When we had rolled stats, I had to choose between a character with an 18 in one stat and less than ideal numbers in other ones or a more balanced character. So she ended up with a 7 strength. She was an orphan who was raised on the streets as a thief, but she was going to grow up to be a powerful mage like both her parents were before they were killed. She had what is hardest to find in a character - personality. In all of my years, no other character meant so much and accomplished so much with so little. She was next to useless in combat having dipped in rogue and human paragon, and she seldom had very many actual combat spells, being a swiss-army mage. She did however save the party numerous times because she always ran away when she was going to die, being smart enough to realize when she was outmatched.

She had grown to level 12 without dying - the only original member of the party still left that hadn't died. She was travelling with her companions and their cohorts (their cohorts... not hers) and they were camped out. Normally, she would climb into her rope trick for the night, but everyone was worried that we should all be available in case we were attacked. Giving in and being nice enough to stay with everyone else, in danger, in case they needed her, she slept on the ground with everyone else. And the stupid shadow attacked her from within the earth sapping 7 points of strength...

No saving throw.
No listen.
No spot.
No chance.

I couldn't even raise her I was so crushed... what a cheap way to go. Everyone else got to die in combat against one of the big-bads, gloriously sacrificing themselves for the good of the party and the city. She dies in her sleep. Sheesh.

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RPGs / Anecdote - "How old?"

« on: August 05, 2009, 04:19:19 PM »

Another anecdote to amuse me...

Our party was travelling through the woods tracking a bunch of goblins. Thrilling, I know. As usual, we had been drinking our adult beverages while we played, because gaming isn't gaming without it. There was plenty of the usual amusement to go around, and our PC's were generally being very successful.

Our ranger, our glorious ranger, was doing some of the best tracking of his life. He rolled nothing less than 15 on the die, and was managing some incredible tracking scores. Since he was rolling so well, the DM was providing an abundance of information. This was not enough for our ranger though - he wanted more. He finally rolled a nat 20 and was asking every detail imaginable. The rest of us, having been playing for a while, but sitting and drinking for a lot of it since he started his sherlock-holmes-in-the-forest routine, were growing a bit rambunctious.

Ranger "Do I find any tracks?"
DM " Yes, with that roll, you find them all."
Ranger "Can I tell what they are?"
DM "Goblins... same as you have been tracking all along."
Ranger "How many of them are there?"
DM "At least a score."
Ranger "Can't I tell exactly? I got a nat 20."
DM "sigh... fine, there are 20."
Ranger "Were they carrying anything?"
DM "Yes, stuff."
Ranger "Heavy stuff?"
DM "Heavy enough to make some prints deeper."
Ranger "How old?"
Me "37, and his name is Dennis. Is that enough detail for you?"
Everyone "<laughter>"
Ranger "I meant how long ago..."
Me "Sure you did, I was just skipping ahead... now can we get going?"

To this day, he can't ask that question without someone laughing...