|
Post by Plum on Aug 22, 2017 13:39:17 GMT 1
Ok, so that title might be a bit overly dramatic, but it feels weird to talk about D&D in the Board Games thread. I'm most familiar with D&D but I thought it would be nice to have somewhere to talk about all sorts of RPG loveliness. Pathfinder? Sure! Monster Hearts? Bring the love! Critical Roll fan? It's high noon! Paranoia agent? Sorry, you don't have clearance for this thread Does anyone play in online groups, via roll20.net or otherwise? What do people think of the new D&D Beyond app and subscription model? What would a Fantasy Strike RPG look like? Nerd out with meeeee! ---- So I'm currently playing a D&D 5e Barbarian who's a big dumb lovable brute who thinks every cat in the world is out to get her after an awkward incident with a handaxe, a wyvern, and an evening dress. We're playing through Curse of Strahd in meatspace and having a great time with it, though I think it will wrap up by the end of the year, so we might start looking at other options. Tomb of Annihilation has been mentioned, or possibly something homemade.
|
|
|
Post by Bomber678 on Aug 22, 2017 13:49:40 GMT 1
BRD has a very silly pathfinder campaign where we're all airship pirates. It's pretty great.
|
|
|
Post by thehug0naut on Aug 22, 2017 15:29:25 GMT 1
I don't rpg online but I'm in two different IRL rpg groups who both play fairly irregularly. One group is playing through a homebrew campaign in D&D3.5, though that is likely switching to 5e in the near future as the group largely prefers it.
My other group has been working through some one-shots to give me a break from running my Savage Worlds Darksun Campaign. We're currently in the middle of our dip into Feng Shui, which has been super hilarious and will likely recur in the future. We've also been known to play D&D4e and 5e, Pathfinder, Orpheus (World of Darkness), Call of Cthulu, and of course Savage Worlds. Maybe going to try out a star trek rpg in the future as we are pretty much all major trek fans.
This reminds me I need to get my Darksun campaign started up again. Absolutely love the setting. Though I call it Darksun, its only mostly based on the D&D setting and has some Avatar (as in Aang/Korra) stuff mixed in because I also <3 that universe so much. Fire/Earth/Air bending is also a really good fit for some of the elemental priest stuff.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Aug 22, 2017 16:46:17 GMT 1
Ohhh I'd love a 5e campaign in the Avatar universe! (I mostly default to 5e because that a 3.5e are the systems that I'm most familiar with). But then I'd also like to be an airship pirate. Airships exist in the Avatar universe. I COULD DO BOTH Did anyone jump on the recent Spire kickstarter? I was so close to backing it because the ideas sound amazing but I'm legit creeped out by spider people and failed my will save For those that missed it, it's a gritty and grimy hive-city setting based in the Drow underdark. Kind of like Shadowrun x D&D x spider-gangsters
|
|
|
Post by Star Slayer on Aug 22, 2017 21:03:56 GMT 1
An RPG set in the world of avatar sounds amazing! There would be a lot of cool character classes, like the four types of benders, machinists/tinkerers, spirit-friends, etc as well as a bunch of classic fighter-types. And the setting has the possibility for so many adventures.
I never played D&D, but I did create a character in 3.5 once. We never got to start that campaign though.
RPGs that I played are: - The Dark Eye - Shadowrun - Call of Cthulhu - (New) World of Darkness
The Dark Eye was my first paper RPG and the one that I played the most. It is very common in Germany, basically the German equivalent to D&D. A bit more grounded though. More middle ages with fantasy than full-blown high fantasy.
We also played a long campaign of World of Darkness set in Moscow. We even made a wiki for that campaign, constantly updating it with infos about the events, NPCs and places. We also had a system for rotating the storyteller. Each individual scenario/chapter was directed by a different member of the group. It worked pretty well.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Aug 23, 2017 10:23:39 GMT 1
Huh that's interesting. I just kind of assumed that D&D was the 'main' RPG everywhere (just like salted popcorn...). I'd never really considered that other countries would have other preferences. Maybe it's due to American media mostly showing something D&D-like whenever they need a group of nerds to roleplay, and TV in the UK showing so much of that.
I'd quite like to play Shadowrun I think, having enjoyed the world shown in the Harebrained PC games.
|
|
|
Post by Star Slayer on Aug 27, 2017 11:24:49 GMT 1
Huh that's interesting. I just kind of assumed that D&D was the 'main' RPG everywhere (just like salted popcorn...). I'd never really considered that other countries would have other preferences. Maybe it's due to American media mostly showing something D&D-like whenever they need a group of nerds to roleplay, and TV in the UK showing so much of that. I think Dungeons & Dragons is the main/standard/gateway roleplaying game in most countries. Germany is certainly an exception. Here, The Dark Eye is what D&D is in most other countries. And the story behind this is actually rather interesting. In the early 80s, a big German boardgame publisher (Schmidt Spiele) wanted to release a translated version of D&D in Germany. They had already started translating it when TSR - elevated by the enormous success of their game - got greedy and demanded outrages licensing fees from Schmidt Spiele. So the latter asked their translators - who were all avid roleplayers and boardgamers - if they could write a ruleset and world for a fantasy roleplaying game in only a couple of months that could be released instead of D&D. The translators pulled it off and within the same year, The Dark Eye was released. And as the first big fantasy roleplaying game available in the German language, it was a huge success. A bit later, TSR released a German version of D&D through other channels because they didn't want to miss out on the rather large German market. However, because most people interested in roleplaying had already started with The Dark Eye and were invested in that system and world, D&D couldn't overtake it and had to play second fiddle. Despite being the original with the more recognizable name. I am not sure if this is still true, but throughout the 80s and 90s, The Dark Eye remained the more popular and better selling game of the two in Germany. And the roleplaying game most Germans started with. Myself included. As for the game itself, it is more grounded and less focused on hack-and-slash than D&D. It is less focused on powergaming and character optimization than D&D and focuses more on storytelling in a rich somewhat medieval fantasy world. The main game is set on the continent of Aventuria. (Yes, that is a wordplay on adventure. The translators wanted to create a world of adventure, after all. And btw, the game was initially meant to be called Aventuria, until Schmidt Spiele decided at the last moment that they didn't want to release it under a made up name and demanded a title made out of proper words. So the game was named after one of the most powerful artifacts in the world: The all-seeing Dark Eye.) Here is a map of Aventuria, btw. Maybe you have seen it before?
|
|
|
Post by Zejety on Aug 27, 2017 20:20:08 GMT 1
I think The Dark Eye gets a couple things right and a couple things wrong. 4th edition made a big point out of being open ended to the point where it was easy to make a character that couldn't contribute at all to a majority of plots. The game prided itself on being able to tell stories without combat, but when combat broke out and you played a pastry chef, you either ran and hid or attacked for a ~20% to hit something. Also, the book was packed with numerically superior opttions for "powergamers", and the opiecemeal approach to character buildings could very much lead to two characters of the same profession be vastly different in terms of optimization. I never really got into it, but skimming forums brought several too-strong advantages and special abilities to my attention.
I think more than anything, it would have been important to hold session zero before a compaign and figure out what everyone's power level was supposed to be - something we never did as teens, of course. Thinking about, we stepped into all the typical pitfalls in all our TDE campaigns - it's hard to blame the system for it but I think it enhances the problem to some degree.
The system is also very tightly connected to its setting (specifically because it has a clear dedicated setting as opposed to D&D), which is pretty xenophobic and hostile. The priests of the main god of the good pantheon hate spell casters (they only tolerate certified guild wizards, and only begrudingly), many countries are openly at war, etc.; so in-party conflicts can easily arise.
Maybe it's just because I am so tired of this, that I am enjoying D&D 5e so much. Classes are (supposed to be) balanced in regards to contribution, especially in combat; and it is generally assumed that the players will cooperate unless otherwise stated, even if it requires meta-gaming. Maybe the latter isn't even that common and I have just been influenced to think that way by the Angry DM's writing...
Speaking of D&D: I've printed out bird's eye view maps of Castle Ravenloft (found on Deviant Art of all places) and spend quite a bit of time today properly labeling it and rolling for random stuff. The maps in the book are scattered over several pages and only labeled with numbers that you then have to reference in the book. It will come in handy to quickly flip between levels and see the names of things at a glance. Even more, I think just the process has helped me figure out how things are connected.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Aug 31, 2017 12:54:48 GMT 1
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Sept 3, 2017 23:07:45 GMT 1
We very nearly had our first full intra-party fight in today's session! After clearing out a tribe of barbarians from an old ruin, we captured the leader to interrogate her. After she'd told us the tiny amount that she knew, the party leader (warlock) wanted to kill her, as did our druid, since she was a 'threat'. Our bard, ranger and myself thought this would be straight up murder since she was bound, weaponless and no threat whatsoever, plus we did go into her home and kill her people - granted they attacked us first, but we did surprise them by blundering in...
Anyway, things escalated quickly when both the druid and warlock suddenly tried to kill the barbarian leader. Our bard wasted high level slots healing the damage caused and our own barbarian (me!) body shielded her to take any further hits. The ranger mostly just stood nearby panicking.
Fortunately killing the barbarian was proving to be an inefficient use of party resources and our warlock gave up and stormed out in disgust, at which point the druid also backed down. In the end we knocked her out and tied her up while we finish up in the ruins, and we'll release her once we're done.
Chaotic good yo, gotta follow your heart <3
|
|
|
Post by Zejety on Sept 4, 2017 21:09:47 GMT 1
A colleague was giving away a free copy of the Shadowrun 5E hardcover today and I've managed to snatch it. I feel a little bad because I doubt that I will actually play it though. I am curious enough to want to read the basic mechanics and lore however! I think I'll read the parts that interest me and gift it on afterwards.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Sept 5, 2017 13:01:20 GMT 1
All I know about the Shadowrun RPG is that you require at least ten thousand d6 to play I'd be curious to hear what you think about it though as I think our RPG tastes run pretty parallel
|
|
|
Post by Southpaw Hare on Sept 5, 2017 18:29:16 GMT 1
Hi guys! So, this weekend, we had a big RPG Weekend Get-together, and it was pretty great. We played several games, the most notable of which was one named Godbound. In short, the game is about being uber-powerful Demi-Gods of abstract concepts. A friend compared it favorably to Exalted, which has a similar system of picking crazy powers ("charms" or "gifts").
Our storyline was gloriously ridiculous. All of our characters, except one, were from a mish-mash of medieval fantasy universes (basically, all the dimensions have crashed together and rifts have opened, kind of like in Rifts). The remaining character, a guy from modern Earth named Bob, was the demi-god of lethargy and laziness. He convinced the group that our adventure should be... to go retrieve Television. Every one of our characters, regardless of how silly or serious their concepts were, agreed that this was a worthy and noble goal - the roguish demi-god of knowledge wanted it for its unbelievable learning potential, my demi-god of crafting and artifice wanted to know how to make newer, cooler things, and the warriors were just really interested in checking out this Game of Thrones thing that Bob was talking about.
Thus, our characters traveled to other worlds, let by Bob, searching for what could help us acquire this miracle of technology. After much effort, we finally found a satellite dish in an apocalyptic future, and my guy (who can understand any crafted object by touching it) learned how to reproduce it. We are now hoping that, using our God Battery that we pulled from the remains of a Super Robot created in the Forges of Heaven, we can build some kind of interdimensional receiver that will receive television broadcasts from all the various planes of the multiverse. We would put it on top of our medieval fortress (which my guy crafted as our HQ single-handedly in a matter of days).
Something about this session really made me think of Teen Titans. We were basically a team of five uber-OP superheroes who just wanted to hang out on the sofa with TV and video games. Maybe order a pizza or two.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Sept 6, 2017 14:38:42 GMT 1
Oh god I really want to try all these weird and wonderful Other RPGs - Bundle of Holding have loads of Apocalypse World stuff at the moment which sounds awesome. But our group has so much time and effort invested in D&D, in terms of books, lore and history - I feel like anything else we'd be starting from scratch
|
|
|
Post by Southpaw Hare on Sept 6, 2017 21:12:39 GMT 1
Oh god I really want to try all these weird and wonderful Other RPGs - Bundle of Holding have loads of Apocalypse World stuff at the moment which sounds awesome. But our group has so much time and effort invested in D&D, in terms of books, lore and history - I feel like anything else we'd be starting from scratch Hardly. This problem you have is quite common, and a lot of people have already come up with the solution for you. Many games are built off of D&D has a thematic framework, but are simpler mechanically. As an example, Dungeon World - the medieval fantasy successor to Apocalypse World - is precisely this, allowing you to use the world and lore of D&D while learning new rules that really only take about 15 minutes to get a grasp of, and maybe 2 or 3 sessions for everyone to master.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Sept 6, 2017 22:40:18 GMT 1
So if I buy and learn the main AW rules, that will extend to things like Dungeon World? Or I might as well just start with DW?
|
|
|
Post by Southpaw Hare on Sept 7, 2017 5:19:21 GMT 1
So if I buy and learn the main AW rules, that will extend to things like Dungeon World? Or I might as well just start with DW? There are similarities, but I recommend starting with Dungeon World. Also, you don't have to buy it - the full rules are free here: www.dungeonworldsrd.com/I also happened to buy the physical book, but it's actually pretty disappointing as far as books go (very bland presentation with little art), and nearly identical to these free rules. Most of the core rules are on the classes page, oddly: www.dungeonworldsrd.com/classes/The universal "Moves" that all characters can do are here: www.dungeonworldsrd.com/moves/Also, I ran a Dungeon World game for a time right here on this very forum: mssanctuary.boards.net/thread/52/dungeon-world-forum-campaign
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Sept 7, 2017 9:44:08 GMT 1
Awesome, thanks SPH - I'm going to try diving into those over the weekend. My group is talking about running some one-shots where we rotate the DM around, and I thought I'd throw a spanner into the works by running mine in a different system as a taster session.
|
|
|
Post by Zejety on Sept 8, 2017 17:58:37 GMT 1
Tomb of Anihilation, the new official D&D adventure/campaign came out today. I see no need to pick it up now but I have a strong feeling that it's going to be the next campaign that I will run. I never ran or played in a hex crawl before.
Also, it has come to my attention that there are rules for (betting on/participating in?) DINOSAUR RACES.
|
|
|
Post by Southpaw Hare on Sept 8, 2017 19:03:16 GMT 1
Awesome, thanks SPH - I'm going to try diving into those over the weekend. My group is talking about running some one-shots where we rotate the DM around, and I thought I'd throw a spanner into the works by running mine in a different system as a taster session. Do let me know how that turns out. I'd love to hear about it!
|
|
|
Post by flagrantangles on Sept 13, 2017 17:58:55 GMT 1
I've been playing in a 3.5 D&D game and it's been a fun exercise in terms of rules fuckery. I had forgotten how intensive 3.5 really gets. Unfortunately, everyone is pretty new to 3.5 and our DM is also new. I give her a lot of credit for trying, but we're running into basically every problem I'd expect from a new DM.
She does ask for criticism though so we're able to provide that. Granted, I feel like I'm the only person who provides substantive criticism. My main problem has been the way she railroads us and how she treats the game as a competition.
I don't mind being railroaded. In some ways, I prefer it. I hate being railroaded when it looks like we're not being railroaded. For instance, she called for a will save and we all auto-failed. I would prefer if I were simply told something like, "You all suddenly fall unconscious."
She also likes to treat everything as a competition between the DM and the players and do it in a way where our abilities are denied to us. I don't mind this some of the time if there's an explanation that makes sense to our characters. Unfortunately, she tries to provide an in-game rules explanation and none of them have actually worked so that gets frustrating.
All that aside, I am still having a fine time because I enjoy playing the game and I do enjoy the people I'm playing with. Ultimately, I'm just looking forward to running a Pathfinder game with everyone and leading by example. I have more experience playing D&D than I think just about everyone else, but not actually all that much with being a DM. I'm certain I'll make my own mistakes and I'm looking forward to that too.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Sept 15, 2017 15:47:02 GMT 1
So our Curse of Strahd DM just asked us "Just curious, do you guys have any preference for what happens if you TPK?" Bear in mind that our party is really struggling at the moment, I have a terrible terrible feeling about the next session... We're in the Amber Temple and have taken an absolute kicking at level seven, possibly because we have no dedicated healer, spellcaster nor rogue. We have a bard, warlock, druid and ranger, so we have some healing, and a barbarian tank to take the hits. The most recent encounter started with three surprise fireballs (DM tried to warn us, but the party had been arguing and one character stormed off, followed shortly after by the others. No-one was being cautious and a temple of death is not the place to be stomping around in a bad mood). So the opening salvo saw most of the party hit the ground and the barbarian (who hadn't had time to rage, so was also badly injured) managed to drag them into a side-room (lecture theatre) before being downed herself, with the exception of the ranger's fallen wolf companion who was left out in the Corridor of Doom. Fortunately one of the others had woken up just long enough to shut the door and began the multi-round process of getting everyone healed up. The ranger's wolf died on the other side of the wall. We were maybe 1/3 healed when a Golem joined the party and began hammering on the door, barely held closed by the barbarian. After it came within a hair of forcing its way through we decided that we couldn't hold out any longer and came up with a desperate plan to lure the golem through the door, push it over and slam the door shut again. Amazingly this plan worked and we managed to burn the golem down and secure the door long enough for a proper short rest. We then pushed further into the temple and immediately took a ton more fireballs and a finger of death (god bless my barb's danger sense keeping her alive). The party panicked and split, most of them running through to the next room and the warlock running back to the 'safety' of the room, only to get pummelled by magic missiles and dropped. The party realised that she wasn't with them and the druid volunteered to sneak out (invisibility), reaching the fallen warlock moments too late to save her life. We did however have a scroll of revivify, which he called back for. Our ranger at this point panicked and opened the door protecting us from further fireballs, while the remaining party members were standing next to it - she ran out clutching the revivify scroll and a fireball hurtled in behind her, dropping the mage NPC and my poor toasty barbarian.
Current status: party split into two, one half has two members unconscious and one very badly injured with no spells left. The other half has two very badly hurt casters with no spells and a dead warlock, with the ranger trying to revivify the 'lock before the next round of horrors turns up.
And the DM asks us how we feel about TPKs...
|
|
|
Post by flagrantangles on Sept 15, 2017 18:19:28 GMT 1
In the CoS game I've been participating in, I WANTED to do the bit you reference in your spoiler, but we never had any reason to mosey over where it is so we bypassed it.
We're well on our way to some kind of resolution though so I'm hoping we finish in another session or two.
As for your party, it sounds like you're in a pretty ROUGH SPOT. It seems weird for the DM to ask how the players feel about TPK's. Is the answer going to alter what they do?
|
|
|
Post by Zejety on Sept 15, 2017 20:20:41 GMT 1
A bard and a druid sounds like plenty of spellcasting and healing though. I don't see how you are missing on those departments?
|
|
|
Post by flagrantangles on Sept 15, 2017 20:55:42 GMT 1
The bard is probably not a dedicated healer and while a druid could be, I suspect this druid is focused on shapeshifting. Furthermore, neither a warlock nor a bard can really take the place of an arcane caster, though both of them together probably could.
|
|
|
Post by Zejety on Sept 16, 2017 0:21:22 GMT 1
A moon druid is still a full caster with the whole Druid list for spell selection. Granted, he (?) can't heal in combat while he's wildshaped, but that's still okay. The only healing-related advantage a land druid has over a moon druid is Natural Recovery, so a couple extra spell slots. The bard also adds a lot of healing during short rests, but I suppose the trouble is picking up people mid-combat... Maybe the Druid should prepare soom Goodberries the night before?
I think you might also be underestimating the bard, but I can only speak about what I read online, as I have not seen one above 4th-5th level in practice yet.
|
|
|
Post by ExSeth on Sept 16, 2017 3:13:13 GMT 1
I f'ing love TPKs, both as a player and as a DM. Disaster stories are the best stories.
And I've seen parties with less healing get by just fine, but it does require teamwork and, y'know, not stumbling into traps and ambushes.
|
|
|
Post by flagrantangles on Sept 18, 2017 14:33:38 GMT 1
Honestly, I just hate bards so I don't keep up with their abilities. I just default to other people's assessments of the class. My friend enjoys bards immensely and just generally likes healing and just generally conveys that they are not excellent healers. In the games I've played, I have not been impressed with the healing a bard can shell out, but sometimes it all comes down the player's choices.
|
|
|
Post by Southpaw Hare on Sept 18, 2017 15:54:55 GMT 1
In place of Bards, I prefer the 3.5 supplemental class, The Factotum. I've always liked the concept of a Jack-of-all-Trades type character, but I've never been satisfied with the Bard as the only one available in the core rules. I don't like the silly, out-of-place emphasis on singing in combat as a thing. The Factotum, on the other hand, is more like the Red Wizard in Final Fantasy - he just does a little of everything and is a smart guy who uses his intelligence to make this well-roundedness work. Mechanically, he can spend points per day based on his intelligence to boost areas temporarily, letting him fill roles as needed.
|
|
|
Post by Plum on Sept 18, 2017 19:35:49 GMT 1
Our magic users CAN heal, though not very well. That's why we're not currently dead. However we're now split in two and have no more spell slots for anything, healing or otherwise. Nor can we take a long rest since we've only just finished one. Even a short rest is risky as we're not in secure locations (though it'll be at least an hour before my barb regains consciousness anyway). The main problem is that we don't have any magical defences of any sort - no counter spell, no protections. With the exception of barbarian rage, everything that hits us goes straight through
|
|