Tabletop Roleplaying Games (D&D, Pathfinder, CoC, ETC.)

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Ghostse said:
You put it on cyberton and have vehicle/robot mode transformation stuff.


I haven't, care to give a run down?
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Better yet I'll put this up it's how I learned of it:
They cut ties with Random House and Judge Academy this week and next year they'll stop selling MtG through Troll and Toad.
 
Martys_not_smarty said:
Better yet I'll put this up it's how I learned of it:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=HBdBJNS3T58They cut ties with Random House and Judge Academy this week and next year they'll stop selling MtG through Troll and Toad.
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Oh those affiliates.
If it wasn't WotC I'd have this pegged as the information age letting a company cut out the middle man to increase profit margins.
Since it is WotC, I'm pretty sure this just means Hasbro/WotC is about to learn why you just pay the B2Bgeld to the racketeers.

In the 1980s, the mob used their control of the Unions to charge a 2% tax on all construction in NYC. When the FBI went looking for informants to break the practice, they found no takers: zero contractors wanted to turn on the mob because in their minds a 2% shakedown was worth it to not have to deal with the unions anymore. (The scheme was only broken up as part of an investigation into the mob control of the garbage industry, where they pushed out a guy and made him angry enough to risk his life to wear a wire)
in this case, Random House covered all store complaints (shipping delays, damage, etc) and I'm pretty sure Hasbro will sortly be wishing that wasn't now their resposibility.

Venom Paul said:
Trying to get back into this after a long time. Has anyone else noticed a decline in the quality of online games? You used to be able to find decent games on /tg/, skype or irc all the time like 10-5 years ago. The problem was people flouncing but once you got used to rolling chars for games that never get played you could find actual games. Now it seems the games never get started at all. I hear irl tabletop is more alive than ever tho. So what changed w online?
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Discord and Trannies.
Additionally Millenial/Z coming in with entitlements, power fantasy, and zero attention span or tolerance for not having their balls fondled 24/7.
 
Message from a player in group chat this past week: "yeah we're probably gonna be wrapping up this campaign in the next couple sessions, probably just a boss fight and then we're done"

The fool.

We only just reached the titular Tomb of Annihilation at the end of the last session after getting the required cubes to open the door. If it's anything like the Tomb of Horrors it's inspired by, we're only just getting started.
 
Will say, my Cyberpunk game has been going well. A bit weird, but good. Last session, the crew had to get someone who'd forgotten to pay money to a fixer from a Middle-Eastern themed place. Was fun, went way differently than I expected.
 
Bloitzhole said:
Has anyone ever had a big town siege / battle? The final battle for this arc is coming up for the group I DM. This was their first proper DnD campaign and I'd like it to end on a high note, but I'm slightly uncertain on how to translate it into fun gameplay.

The module is "Ghosts of Saltmarsh" and since the finale in that book is just an endless slog of a dungeon crawl (even though a fish people / Sahuagin invasion is teased throughout the entire module), I will instead have the semi-prepared coastal town be attacked while the group has been lured away (which has resulted in our first highly unexpected player death when a 1 was rolled on the second death save. The sentence "Don't worry, just healing word me next round" is now a meme) and the players returning about an hour or two into the battle to reinforce the defenders and turn the tide. Think "Shadow over Innsmouth - The Siege".

I am considering them having to divide resources between different important points, deciding what to reinforce/where to help etc. with the major NPCs (or rather, the ones they actually like) being especially endangered every now and again. But I'm really, really open for input because I want this to matter for them but also be fun.
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If I remember correctly I have run two sieges, one offensive one defensive. However I was using a home brew "combat unit." Ruleset for the enemy and the friendlies. The party had 4-6 units under their command, in both cases one character did all the commanding while everyone else slung fireballs or what have you around to help even the odds.

At least for me running big groups of allies or enemies as units tends to work best especially on a larger scale. Let's say the party has 100 archers total to help them defend. The more archers in a unit, the wider an area they can shoot at and the more damage it does. It works for melee troops too, just in melee range. They can split them off into smaller sections to cover more ground or keep them all together to concentrate their strength in one place. As the defender, they should always be out numbered. So it might be fun to throw in tons of low health goons to use up resources and cause minor casualties. It's great fun for the party too. Nothing makes a wizard feel more powerful than deleting entire sections of the assault with a well placed fire ball.

As for other concerns. Most sieges didn't actually end in an assault. Obviously having the enemy play "let's just wait until they starve to death." Isn't very exciting, but resource management could make for an interesting challenge. The party might need to sneak out to to find food or wood for arrows/barricades. Maybe the enemy poisoned one of the wells and now 30 men are sick and your cleric now has no choice but spend his time purifying the precious water source.

Unless the town has been evacuated, there will be citizens that need protecting. While annoying, this can provide meaningful decisions for the party to make. Put those peasents to work by helping reinforce buildings or creating choke points. Or press them into service if you feel it's necessary. Chances are though, they probably aren't going to fight very well.

Something adventuring parties are basically tailor made for is conducting small scale operations. Maybe the garrison commander will send them out on a sortie to buy some time for the defenders to prepare or wait for relief. Maybe he wants them to sneak into the enemy camp and get a count of how many spell casters they have? Maybe the situation is so desperate, that the only way the city has any hope is if the enemy commander dies before he can lead an assault.

I hope some of this helps.
 
Bloitzhole said:
Has anyone ever had a big town siege / battle? The final battle for this arc is coming up for the group I DM. This was their first proper DnD campaign and I'd like it to end on a high note, but I'm slightly uncertain on how to translate it into fun gameplay.

The module is "Ghosts of Saltmarsh" and since the finale in that book is just an endless slog of a dungeon crawl (even though a fish people / Sahuagin invasion is teased throughout the entire module), I will instead have the semi-prepared coastal town be attacked while the group has been lured away (which has resulted in our first highly unexpected player death when a 1 was rolled on the second death save. The sentence "Don't worry, just healing word me next round" is now a meme) and the players returning about an hour or two into the battle to reinforce the defenders and turn the tide. Think "Shadow over Innsmouth - The Siege".

I am considering them having to divide resources between different important points, deciding what to reinforce/where to help etc. with the major NPCs (or rather, the ones they actually like) being especially endangered every now and again. But I'm really, really open for input because I want this to matter for them but also be fun.
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Last time I ran a big battle, I ran it with wargame rules. I actually used a civil war game, but the rules worked well enough. The cannons became catapults, the rifles became arrows and magic, and there you go. If I had to do it again, I'd probably get Oathmark from Warlord Games.
 
I talked about D&D with my little brother and he said very enthusiastically that he wants to play someday, but I think it's a little too complex for him. Is there any other RPG that I can make an one shot for him to see if he likes it?
 
Foxymophandlemama said:
I talked about D&D with my little brother and he said very enthusiastically that he wants to play someday, but I think it's a little too complex for him. Is there any other RPG that I can make an one shot for him to see if he likes it?
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How old is he? Kids pick up stuff quicker than you think.

You might consider using one of the less heavy versions, like redbox Basic. That's fairly simple.
 
Capsaicin Addict said:
How old is he? Kids pick up stuff quicker than you think.

You might consider using one of the less heavy versions, like redbox Basic. That's fairly simple.
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He's 10, but not familiar with RPGs at all. Also he has some learning difficulties so I want to make something simple as a start. If he likes it then we can move on to bigger adventures 😀

I will check that, thank you!
 
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Foxymophandlemama said:
He's 10, but not familiar with RPGs at all. Also he has some learning difficulties so I want to make something simple as a start. If he likes it then we can move on to bigger adventures 😀

I will check that, thank you!
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Aforementioned HeroQuest is actually probably right up his alley and age group.

And I once again have the thorny ethical issue of Woketards of the Coast being a shit company with good QC & production values when they make something that isn't wokeshit (which I guess is less thorny if you buy them from your FLGS)
Woketards makes two products that are probably in what you're looking for. Neither to my understanding is injected with woke.

The first is the D&D Adventure System Boardgames. They are Cooperative ver nearly-D&D WMPRPG experience. You have a character that never advances beyond level 2 exploring a random dungeon built by exploring randomized titles and fighting monsters and getting treasure/XP. (Most monsters have 1HP, some have two HP. Player attacks do 1 damage, PCs have 6 - 12HP). D20 is rollled for attacks but no other dice are used. There are about a half dozen that all use the same overall mechanics with variations. You can also take PCs (or monsters) between different games.
Some of the games later in the run introduce an on-going campaign metric with persistent gear & upgrades.
The really nice thing is all the interlocking tiles you place randomly are 6x6 1" gridded, and all the minis for monsters and player are 1" scaled, so even without a PHB you could use all the components in the box to build some simple adventures. And if you bring out the PHB, you can use the minis & tiles to run normal encounters.
Basically for $50-60 bucks you get a self-contained TTRPG frog-boiling box that goes all the way to full-boil. The only downside (other than the cost) is if you aren't getting it second hand, you're supporting Woketards of the Coast. And if you are, its probably going to be missing parts. because there about 50 minis, 300-some cards, and cardboard punch-out counters & markers. So I guess get it from your FLGS and feel better about it.
Unless they've got a troon working the register then I don't know what to tell you.

The other is "Advenure Begins" which is a much smaller and less involved affair. I haven't any experience with this one, but some people seem to like it for introducing younger players to TTRPG.

If you can locate a copy, Storm Hollow is also very good. Its a TTRPG meant for younger players. It was kickstarter with troubled development (the creators had their hearts in the right place but zero experience in game dev/delivery) - so looks like they did the kickstarter fulfillment and then no other runs, so copies are are about as easy to find as Hen's teeth.

For sink-or-swim with simple system:
MazeRats. Its a free PDF on DTRPG. Rules-light bellcurve(2d6) RPG with random spell table in an OSR vein.

I have heard, but can't verify, Bunnies and Burrows is good for younger players.
 
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Bloitzhole said:
Has anyone ever had a big town siege / battle? The final battle for this arc is coming up for the group I DM. This was their first proper DnD campaign and I'd like it to end on a high note, but I'm slightly uncertain on how to translate it into fun gameplay.

The module is "Ghosts of Saltmarsh" and since the finale in that book is just an endless slog of a dungeon crawl (even though a fish people / Sahuagin invasion is teased throughout the entire module), I will instead have the semi-prepared coastal town be attacked while the group has been lured away (which has resulted in our first highly unexpected player death when a 1 was rolled on the second death save. The sentence "Don't worry, just healing word me next round" is now a meme) and the players returning about an hour or two into the battle to reinforce the defenders and turn the tide. Think "Shadow over Innsmouth - The Siege".

I am considering them having to divide resources between different important points, deciding what to reinforce/where to help etc. with the major NPCs (or rather, the ones they actually like) being especially endangered every now and again. But I'm really, really open for input because I want this to matter for them but also be fun.
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While I'm not familiar with Ghosts of Saltmarsh itself, I have run events like that. So here's my thoughts:

1) Are you running the kind of table where The Good Guys (or at least, The Party) always wins? Are you comfortable with making them uncomfortable? The possibility of defeat, or at least serious setbacks, can add some depth. For example, maybe they don't reinforce one part of the castle, and one of their strongest NPC allies ended up rallying a few defenders and stopping a breach at that location, but at the cost of their own lives - along with the realization by the party that they might have saved their friend had they been more thoughtful about where to station troops.

2) Relatedly, what is going to play out if they aren't involved? Think of this as the "worst case" scenario. What if the party is maximally effective? This is your "best case." Deciding these endpoints ahead of time let you prepare for whatever ends up happening, which will likely be some result between these endpoints.

3) Think about what's at stake: Do the PCs have a home base full of treasure they need to guard? Friends and family among the NPCs? Make sure the siege threatens those things.

4) Think of a couple "set-piece" fights and build those, and have those taken together determine the outcome. For example, one setpiece might be stopping a battering ram at the gates; another might be stopping a ritual on a visible-from-town hill that seems to be an attempt to raise an army of skeletons; another might be dealing with a bunch of enemy catapults that suddenly roll up, while stopping an incursion from tunnels or a sewer system might be another. Maybe they use ranged attacks to pick off the battering ram, use a magically-enabled sortie to disrupt the necromancers, help craft their own catapult for counter-battery fire... and maybe they don't notice until too late that the sewer incursion happened, at which point the attackers have set several fires and carried off an important item or person and retreated back through the tunnels.

5) Are diplomacy or religion important parts of the campaign? Petitioning neighboring forces or the deities for aid (or "favors to be named later") can add some depth beyond fighting and moral choices, and provide good hooks for later gaming.

6) Who cares what happens, in a broader sense? Are nearby rulers going to be impressed or dismayed? Will the glory of a heroic defense or the infamy of a humiliating defeat follow the party?
 
My current Delta Green team seems more like a classic CoC group than a proper Delta Green one. We've got a medical doctor, an Arab Catholic professor of theology, a mercenary, a rich eccentric big game hunter, and only one proper glownigger.
 
Alabama Gamer said:
My current Delta Green team seems more like a classic CoC group than a proper Delta Green one. We've got a medical doctor, an Arab Catholic professor of theology, a mercenary, a rich eccentric big game hunter, and only one proper glownigger.
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Did the fed piss off the entire chain of command and the rest of the party is his punishment? Because I've been in parties like that and it's fun at times to look at every other player at the table and go "I died and this is hell right? You cannot possibly not be punishment from an actively vindictive deity."
 
Morethanabitfoolish said:
Did the fed piss off the entire chain of command and the rest of the party is his punishment?
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I wouldn't say it's necessarily a punishment it almost is, the handler just gives his strongest tard wranglers the most autistic tards. Their first night at the opera would've been entirely fucked if not for Agent Foxwar's silver tongue.
 
Ghostse said:
Looks alright. I guess only negatives I gotta add are wooden slipcases are usually never a great idea in practice, and the books are pretty pricey. $150 for just PHB & DMG in hardcover with PHB/DMG/MM PDFs is kinda steep.
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Yeah, the problem is that the price of RPGs is kind of artificially kept low by WOTC/PBTA hacks, so big projects like Worlds without Number or ACKS end up getting treated with similar expectations. But the PDF's are industry standard at like 20$ a piece.
 
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