The Gaming Den

Judging__Eagle wrote:Gygax and Arneson weren't really innovating; they were simply evolving the existing content.

Not sure why you think that's not innovating. It pretty much describes all human advance...standing on the shoulders of giants and all.

"A dwarf in a steel top hat and steel tuxedo called MC Killzalot, the most famous dwarven rapper who's on the skids after a disastrous attempt at a prog rock album. Oh, his class is Fighter." ~Mike Mearls, head designer of Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition introducing his character. I had ...

Thanks for the heads up, Raddu. I think its now much more reasonable (and acessible) to rpg fans interested in the setting and not so much in the music (not that its bad or something). Good luck with the project. I cant wait to see the final product. ;) I'm going to hazard a guess that Raddu's pres...

Handwaving Matrix stuff is a good tip - anyway, I don't think anyone wants to play a decker; they want to be mage, adept, street samurais or riggers.


Are there any common house-rules to make combat faster?

So I've recently played Shadowrun Returns, and I did read a lot of shadowrun novels as a teenager. I would like to start a SR pnp campaign, but I've never really played it before. Years ago I played a single game at a Con, and I remember I thought it was fiddly and overly complicated. So.. what edit...

Freaks and Geeks had a pretty cool episode about D&D, with Carlos the Dwarf and everything.

- Some of the weirder GURPS sourcebooks (as they are an amazing read even for non-GURPS players), e.g. Voodoo, Bunnies and Burrows, ... - Burning Wheel (I don't like it, but it sure does look interesting when leafing through it - Labyrinth Lord (for the Gamers who still remember 1e) - Trail of Cthul...

As a CS person: No, it's not hard, it's just that no one is paying me to do it. Any 2nd or 3rd year CS person could do it given sufficient time. Actual professionals should be embarrassed to have "spent 5 years on a VTT program and got nothing done" on their rap sheet. Considering the kin...

Keep in mind this is a GREAT WYRM Dragon of some kind, not sure if that matters in the sense of legacy context, but it is certainly a 1000yr old being of incalculable intellect and cosmic magical power. So on both those points, this dragon would probably be like the final boss of a game, and yet it...

Ok, it's getting worse: Attack bonuses don't increase. Hitpoints do.

http://www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx ... l/20120604

Apparently according to Lisa (one of the designers) they never did any real playtesting at all. And this is a surprise to you? Why? They knew that 3.5 sells already, and making sure that everyone thinks they are improving the ruleset was much more important that actually improving the ruleset. And ...

shadzar wrote:failure is to be expected.

A property that WotC shares with shadzar posts.

from the wired interview: http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2012/05/d- ... ike-mearls

Mike Mearls wrote: We want to have a solid set of rules, but at the same time I think D&D is at its best when the game is about the DM’s rulings rather than the actual rules.

No.

http://www.enworld.org/forum/news/323230-d-d-next-chat-transcript-mike-mearls-jeremy-crawford.html Mearls speaks more. Apparently it's not a crossbow at-will, it's still useful outside of combat. For destroying the scenery. Ok, thats, erm, different than 4e I guess. Also, fighters only get nice thi...

Flurry allows you to make multiple attacks as if using Two Weapon Fighting. You can substitute any of these attacks with an unarmed strike if you choose, up to all of them. If a weapon or attack is different than the others, it was the intent to limit that to the maximum number of attacks you could...

Whatever else can be said about Pathfinder, it certainly READS a lot better than 4ed or any came I could make personally (I tend towards bare bones when it comes to rule text, which works fine in play but isn't going to sell me any books). I don't agree. Pathfinder rulebooks present all the rules h...

Well, if one's goal is to keep attribute scores = bonuses, with your suggestion a few things would be required. Either Stats do not add up bonuses to attack, AC, etc. and thus 3-18 in attributes is purely in the realm of skill checks, arm wrestling contests and so forth, and has no direct attributi...

A MMO that goes into development in Nov 2011 isn't going to launch before 2015. MMOs have really long development cycles. An MMO that is to be created "by a dedicated group of creative people with backgrounds in tabletop hobby gaming and online videogame development" will not launch. Ever...

I like 4e multi-classing in that it removes the worst abuses of 3E multi-classing. I think my answer would be:

4e multi-classing, but any power from the non-base-class use the highest ability modifier for attack and damage.

The problems I potentially see with this is that starting stats make a bigger difference than level, maybe that's ok or not, not completely sure. I think it should be the other way around. Hit-Chance should be dependent only on level, not on attributes. Maybe put some minimum attributes for classes...

Korwin wrote:Well D&D3.X isnt so hard to read. Its in fact to easier to read (in english) - for this native german speaker, ie: me - than DSA in german.

That's not surprising. DSA is an abomination.

Just wait until you see the spellsplinger wizard. You can shoot some spells and add the guns' enhancement to the save DC. Accompanied by an illustration of an arcane sharpshooter...

Also, you get a x3 crit modifier for touch spells.

too many little bitch options and long feat chains. there are some cool abilities in the game but having to spend five feats so I can full attack after casting dimension door seems a little much. how is that developing my character? it's just pushing him into one-trick ponyland Who cares as long as...

Chamomile wrote:TTRPGs require both constant use of math and imagination in a world that's clogged with movies and video games requiring neither. While by no means moron-proof, it is at least more moron-resistant than most hobbies.

I take it you've never visited the Paizo or WotC boards?

I don't know what to tell you. Do you honestly think that Essentials would have been more successful if it had been called AD&D 3, notwithstanding that it was a warmed-over hash of 4E concepts? Only a moron would believe that. Good thing then that such a large percentage of the human race consi...