Sean K. Reynolds wrote:I've given every class I made, including monster classes, Craft and Listen because every class should allow for the option of someone being a suboptimal character. Want to play a minotaur weaponsmith? Fine, no point in making you pay the cross-class cost. Want to play a fighter who always had an interest in bookbinding? Ditto.
Basically, the old salt just said that taking ranks in Craft and Listen result in a suboptimal character. I could understand for Craft, but for Listen? Harr! Ye must rely on yer senses or a ninja will plant his knife in yer back! This also applies to real life as well as D&D!
Koumei wrote:I'm just glad that Jill Stein stayed true to her homeopathic principles by trying to win with .2% of the vote. She just hasn't diluted it enough!
Koumei wrote:I am disappointed in Santorum: he should carry his dead election campaign to term!
Just a heads up... Your post is pregnant... When you miss that many periods it's just a given.
I want him to tongue-punch my box.
]
The divine in me says the divine in you should go fuck itself.
I have the New Argonauts (and a free dead greek ... no seriously he gave them out when I got my signed copy at Gen Con a few years ago) and I have to say that it's sort of good, for a half brain dead DM who didn't really take the time to really flesh out his campaign for more generic use. In that effect it is no better or no worse than any other DM's crappy homebrewed scenarios right out of the box.
Of course when you realize he's not anyother DM, but a major game designer one has to simply sigh and go
Seriously, this expresses The New Argonauts more eloquently than any set of words can.
Okay so there was one thing good about New Argonauts.
*points at tzor's miniature*
Combine with the "dead level" articles* and you get a recipe for comical fail.
*I have to get a least a jab every once in a while.
Koumei wrote:I'm just glad that Jill Stein stayed true to her homeopathic principles by trying to win with .2% of the vote. She just hasn't diluted it enough!
Koumei wrote:I am disappointed in Santorum: he should carry his dead election campaign to term!
Just a heads up... Your post is pregnant... When you miss that many periods it's just a given.
I want him to tongue-punch my box.
]
The divine in me says the divine in you should go fuck itself.
Oh yeah, SKR has never written anything good. At all. Ever.
We don't make fun of him as much as Mike right now because Mike Mearls is important in the 4e design team and talking a lot. Heck, in the past we rarely made fun of SKR because Andy Collins and before that Skip Williams were saying so much more stupid shit.
It's not that SKR is more talented than Skip Williams. He's not. Skip Williams is a much better writer who has frequently come up with ideas that are good. No, the reason we rarely make fun of Sean Reynolds is because he isn't important.
FrankTrollman at [unixtime wrote:1197316970[/unixtime]]No, the reason we rarely make fun of Sean Reynolds is because he isn't important.
In all fairness, SKR was the guy who had a mini painting contest on his web site that got me back into painting minis. So he's important to me anyway.
You know, if it wasn't for the fact that I'll probably never go to another Gen Con again, I would be so tempted to outdo SKR by really promoting my great idea which I rolled out at Astrid's Parlor. Shampoo of Charisma! I'd even make a vido promotion. I know just the people.
Captain_Bleach at [unixtime wrote:1197314069[/unixtime]]Monte Cook is ten times more awesome than any other WotC game designer, anyway.
What has Monte done that was really any good? I've read arcana Unearthed/Evolved and all that stuff that's solely Monte's work. I wasn't impressed at all.
Then there was the Monte ranger rewrite where he opens by talking about the problems with the ranger and then goes to say how he didn't fix any of them.
Because regardless of game balance, his ideas are pretty cool and not just plain dumb. Of course, Monte Cook's World of Darkness is an exception to the rule, as even if it were the best rules system ever, the feel of it does not mix well with WoD.
Hmm. I disagree. He doesn't seem to have a lot of ideas. He's revised a shit load of things (sorcerer, ranger, bard), modified a bunch of other things (the D&D spell system for AE, which works a bit better, but has a boatload of its own flaws), played unsuccessfully with archetypes (the AE classes and races, which... after playing with them for a while, utterly cease to inspire. In general, they're way too rigid, when they flat out aren't too weird to be archetypes). But he doesn't have a lot of ideas, as such. I mean, a giant city beside a giant dungeon at the edge of fading empire? That isn't an idea. Thats totally milking the game's tropes. He also seems have a bizarre fetish for once per day abilities and templates, both of which make for the cranky.
On a random note, I absolutely can not conceive of you as a pirate. You come across more like a metrosexual yuppie with a swear jar. With about 3 quarters in it.
Voss at [unixtime wrote:1197344096[/unixtime]]But he doesn't have a lot of ideas, as such. I mean, a giant city beside a giant dungeon at the edge of fading empire? That isn't an idea. Thats totally milking the game's tropes. On a random note, I absolutely can not conceive of you as a pirate. You come across more like a metrosexual yuppie with a swear jar. With about 3 quarters in it.
But remaking pieces of literature into your own story is a time-honored tradition!
As to the second part, it is just an alias.
Edit: Voss, if you are trying to be funny and original, you are certainly succeeding at it. Ever tried to become a writer?
But he isn't remaking literature. Or a story, really (AE & Ptolus are fairly fucking bare, fluff-wise). He's literally just tweaking things like classes, slightly.
Check out the revised sorcerer for BOEM. Hit die increase, 4 sp/level with a slightly different skill selection and Eschew Materials worked into the class. Whee. But, oh, you pay for all that. Some spells are randomly shifted up a level for the sorcerer. Including useful ones like shield and invisibility. Because the sorcerer is 'too good' if it isn't blasting, since thats what it was intended for.
Same with AEs warmain. Its like a fighter, but about half the feat choices are replaced with set abilities. Some of which might have been useful 6 levels earlier, but by the time you get them, you don't care.
Captain_Bleach at [unixtime wrote:1197346099[/unixtime]]Monte's ideas are much better fluff-wise than crunch, if that's what you're getting at.
It isn't. Crunch-wise they're absolutely derivative, but fluff-wise they're empty. Soulless, empty wastelands, where dragons make demon dragon hybrids that get chased off by giants and no one fucking cares, because it all happened two thousand years ago and it might as well be bisexual fairy orgies happening in the moonlight, because they don't let you see that shit either.
Uh, yeah. Thats the setting for AE. Pretty much all of it (except for the faerie orgies, because thats too interesting for the Lands of the Diamond Throne). The giants rule the other races that the evil demon-dragon things had enslaved, and now the dragons have shown back up to reclaim their ancient lands, and... thats pretty much it. The culture, society and even religion are pretty much vague, faceless things. The giants might be pseudo-roman but there is so little info that its really hard to tell.
