The Gaming Den

I use streetwise the way Shadowrun uses the Etiquette skill: it represents the ability to blend into a crowd without standing, work a room, subtly ask around about information, etc. It's a good skill to have around for information gathering montages, and distinct from deception and intimidation: it...

My personal preference would be to ditch musical instruments as discrete, individual 'tools' and keep performance. Because honestly separate skills for hundreds of individual things is fucking dumb, and your attempt to busk or impress nobles or whatever can have whatever fucking flavor text you wan...

Instruments give me a headache all around. They sub for spell components, but take up both hands in most cases, and sometimes also the mouth. The flute player shouldn't be able to do anything, unless it is a material component only spell. And any spell that has material components that cost money i...

*but weapon and shield is a serious issue for casters. You can take a feat to get around it, but that only (and specifically) gets around somatic components, not material components, which also need a free hand (though it can be the same one used for somatic components). Holy symbols (as in clerics...

Results, in case you want to do any analytics type of stuff: Answers: 1:a, 2:b, 3:c, 4: a (but b was close), 5: b, 6:b (c was close), 7:a (c was close), 8: b, 9:b, 10:a, 11:a, 12:b (c was _very_ close), 13:a Results: Witch: 4 Transhuman: 3 Vampire: 2 Lycanthrope: 2 Leviathan: 1 Animate: 1 Astral: 0 ...

Thanks. Holy fuck, paladins kept a lot of shit I wouldn't have expected, like the add charisma bonus to all saves (and friendly saves within 10'/30' depending on level). And the Oath of the Ancients gets 'take half damage from all spells' at level 7, and that is also an aura. Agreed, the save bonus...

-encounter design is bug fuckery. The first two encounters are jokes (4 goblins and 2 goblins respectively), and the party just can't deal with the bugbear (though much of that was dice rolls). Even discounting the wolf, the bugbear and 5 goblins is far too much for the party. Assuming the goblins ...

-encounter design is bug fuckery. The first two encounters are jokes (4 goblins and 2 goblins respectively), and the party just can't deal with the bugbear (though much of that was dice rolls). Even discounting the wolf, the bugbear and 5 goblins is far too much for the party. Assuming the goblins ...

Anyone have good rules for the effects of drinking alcohol in D&D? Stolen from a GM I respect: "When drinking you are allowed to take a penalty of -1 to -3 (player's choice) to your DEX, WIS and INT. If you take -3, you're going to throw up tomorrow unless you're a dwarf. If you're trying ...

... The suggestion must be worded in such a manner as to make the course of action sound reasonable ... That's maybe my least favorite line in the book so far. This is a recipe for too many fights at too many tables. I'd change it to "as to make the course of action not directly harmful to the...

G) Equipment. All of 4e's "this weapon/armor is the one true weapon/armor". Nonsensical pricing (maul and greatsword are pretty much identical, greatsword costs 5x I'm particularly fond of the glaive and halberd, which are identical. The longsword and battleaxe aren't as rich, but it's 5G...

Sleep affects 2d8 hp of creatures, average 9. That is even worse. Point of clarification: my PDF reads 5d8 for the sleep spell. Which averages a much more reasonable ~22. Enough to put down two hobgoblins on a good day. I think it's definitely the level 1 spell to take. Regarding the number discrep...

@Pragma, Red Bob and Cyberzombie Re: I think you guys are being too mean to people on the Internet. First, there's this quote: I go to sites where people are crucifying me on the internet, and I'm not logged in, people don't know I'm there, and I still read all those posts. I think that's something...

I also think the Den's tone is one of the worst ways to promulgate that kind of criticism The reason for such a tradition is a rejection of passive aggression in favor of active aggression. We like to think that such reduces the echo-chamber effect of internet forums and helps to prevent groupthink...

I'd be happy to just get a designer who writes a game that lets you do fun stuff and has some sound math behind it that doesn't break. I think there's a problem with these two goals. If you're not careful about your rules for fun stuff (eg: playing a musical instrument for effectively free bonuses)...

But more damning still: I don't think any of the items on that page actually require themselves to be attuned. It says that "certain items" count against your 3 item limit, but none of the items listed next to it (enhanced armor, enhanced weapon, boots of striding and springing, gauntlets...

SR5 is so bad it made me drop Shadowrun after having a blast with SR3 and 4. (By the way, does anyone know of games that handle espionage as well. Possibly under the FUDGE/FATE system; that RNG and skill combination seems quite mechanically sound at first glance.) The game suggests that enchanting i...

Though this is way too hot a campaign for me to handle, D&D provides a really natural lens to inspect religious extremism because religious extremists get superpowers. I'd been kicking around the idea of a terrorist cleric dropping empowered flame strikes on civilian targets where the twist is t...

Robert Smallheart is a human with poorly-kempt, dark hair and a hooked nose. He's the black sheep of a noble family, and his moral character should be inferred by observing that people who earned the name 'smallheart' don't want to hang out with him. He's crashing the party on the strength of the f...

Thogdork Brambleblaster, Son of the Axe that Felled a Thousand Trees: A low level Dwarf ranger. His father is a new-money Dwarf lord who built a kingdom by clear-cutting some forest on the side of mountain. Consequently, Thogdork has a somewhat unhealthy obsession with forestry and, unless prodded, ...