Phonelobster Shakes The Angry Fist at Star Wars Saga

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RadiantPhoenix
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Post by RadiantPhoenix »

I missed the part where he made a typo. My bad.
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Post by PhoneLobster »

DSMatticus wrote:TPL is now claiming that because I reject his fallacious readings of the text, I must necessarily reject all of the text.
NO.

Focus.

Pay attention.

Show some honesty and some fucking spine.

YOU have presented the argument that unless a line of text says you absolutely CAN'T do something then it is a guideline you can totally ignore.

The lines of text on total CL also do not include an absolute prohibition on how high the total CL is allowed to be.

SO fucking man up and admit it.

Your argument if applied broadly instead of cherry picking the text you wish to apply "it doesn't say I absolutely can't!" to LITERALLY is an argument that lets you send infinite fucking star destroyers as opponents.

Don't hide behind "but there is a formula!" because the specific text about what the inputs and outputs of that formula should be specifically does NOT prohibit the numbers from being "anything you want" it is, once again, just a guideline telling you that there might be bad outcomes as your CL approaches fucking infinity.

Because the game never says you can't do that. It just advises against it with guidelines in EXACTLY the same manner as the multiple opponent text you are dismissing as not a rule.
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Post by CatharzGodfoot »

Thanks PL. That was a good read. I needed more Saga hate in my life.

But please just stop trying to use apostrophes.
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Post by DSMatticus »

momothefiddler wrote:That said, is your argument that Burstfire is totally just ranged power attack and it only references Autofire for teh lulz and is, in fact, completely unrelated? Because that's what I'm getting from you and it doesn't seem terribly likely.
Have you played... I don't know, Shadowrun? Does the idea that automatic weapons might have multiple disjoint things you can do while in a particular firing mode really seem unlikely to you?

Look: autofire is a firing mode some guns have. Some guns don't have autofire, and some guns have nothing but autofire. If your gun has autofire, you can spend a swift action at any time to change into autofire mode. The text says this right in the autofire section.

When in autofire mode, this happens: "autofire is treated as an area attack (sea Area Attack, page 155). You target a 2-square-by-2-square area, make a single attack roll at a -5 penalty, and compare the result to the reflex defense of every creature in the area. Creatures you hit take full damage, and creatures you miss take half damage."

Burst Fire is a feat that allows a character to use a gun set to autofire mode in a new way: "the Burst Fire feat allows you to use a weapon set on autofire against a specific creature instead of an area. You take a -5 penalty on your attack roll but deal +2 dice of damage. ... This is not considered an area attack, so the damage cannot be reduced using the evasion talent (see below)."

PL's argument has two steps, and they are both bullshit.
1) See the quote for autofire, where it says autofire is an area attack and references a page number? The two sentences that follow that are completely identical to the area attack mechanics except they specify the size of the area and an attack penalty. PL is claiming that because the description reproduces parts of the area attack mechanic, autofire has those properties independently of the fact that it's an area attack. But that's fucking stupid. It's coming directly on the heels of a mention and page reference to area attacks; it's obviously explanatory. If that text is explanatory and not a mechanical function independent of autofire's nature as an area attack, then the fact that Burst Fire isn't an area attack is the beginning and end of this discussion about whether or not it deals half damage on a miss.

PL is seriously arguing that "fighters have a full BAB progression. They gain +1 base attack bonus each level" would make fighters immune to "Curse of Incompetence: victims of this spell have their BAB progression for all levels set to poor" because the +1 base attack bonus fighters get each level isn't an explanation of the preceding text, it's a mechanical ability distinct from their full BAB progression. It's fucking insane! No sane person can subscribe to this theory!

Descriptions of attributes are not redundant with the attributes they are describing, and if you lose the attribute you do not get to keep the description of that attribute.

2) Because Burst Fire is described under the autofire header (it is), it inherits the attributes of autofire. This is a testable claim. Autofire contains a -5 penalty. Burst Fire contains a -5 penalty. If Burst is an option layered on top of autofire, then the total penalty for Burst Fire would be -10. But NPC's in the game have the exact same attack bonus for Autofire and Burst Fire in their statblocks. Claim tested; test failed.

Burst Fire is exactly what it says on the label. It "allows you to use a weapon set on autofire against a specific creature instead of an area." If you have the Burst Fire feat and your weapon is set to autofire, you get a special attack option, and that attack option "is not considered an area attack." It is described under the autofire header not because it is a mechanic that applies on top of autofire attacks, but because it is a unique attack that requires that your gun is set to autofire mode. Which is a real action in the game and requires a swift action.

Both legs of PL's argument hinge on willful stupidity and do not hold up under any scrutiny at all. They're fucking insane!
PhoneLobster wrote:YOU have presented the argument that unless a line of text says you absolutely CAN'T do something then it is a guideline you can totally ignore.
This is not a thing that happened. For all your fucking whining and accusations you will not find a single quote anywhere in this entire thread that says what you are claiming I have said, and this is your challenge to do so right here. Find me saying "unless the text says you absolutely can't do something you can ignore it" or anything equivalent to that. Put up or shut up. And know that when you inevitably try to lift something out of context that you think will kind-of-sort-of hit the mark this is a fucking forum and I know how to find my own posts and quote the entire relevant portion.

You have presented the argument that when a line of text says "avoid drinking coffee unless you're trying to stay awake" "avoid encounters with more than a dozen opponents unless you want the heroes to feel overwhelmed" it actually means "never drink coffee" "never have encounters with more than a dozen opponents."

I have rejected the notion that "don't do X unless you want Y" means "never do X," and instead means "you could do X if you wanted Y".

You started this argument with an insane interpretation of the text, and now you are trying to claim that my rejection of your insane interpretation of the text is a rejection of the text itself, which is only true if your insane interpretation is in fact what the text says, which is what we are actually fucking arguing about you stupid fuck. Your argument is completely circular. You are a shitty and dishonest person.

If "avoid drinking coffee unless you're trying to stay awake" doesn't mean "don't drink coffee," then I am not ignoring the hypothetical coffee guidelines when I drink coffee. And that means when the hypothetical coffee guidelines also say "coffee may be hot and cause scalding" I am not being inconsistent when I choose not to pour coffee all over my dick.
RadiantPhoenix wrote:
spongeknight wrote:Yeah, I'm siding with PL on this one. Saying that you shouldn't overwhelm players with huge amounts of characters because that is likely to kill them
It doesn't say that: it says "[make] the heroes [...] feel overwhelming.", not "[make] the heroes [...] feel overwhelmed.", which means the game expects the party to wipe the floor with them.

EDIT: I missed the part where DSM said he made a typo.
Allow me to apologize for leading you astray. Probably should have fixed.
Last edited by DSMatticus on Mon Nov 10, 2014 12:39 am, edited 3 times in total.
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Post by momothefiddler »

DSMatticus wrote:
momothefiddler wrote:That said, is your argument that Burstfire is totally just ranged power attack and it only references Autofire for teh lulz and is, in fact, completely unrelated? Because that's what I'm getting from you and it doesn't seem terribly likely.
Have you played... I don't know, Shadowrun? Does the idea that automatic weapons might have multiple disjoint things you can do while in a particular firing mode really seem unlikely to you?

Look: autofire is a firing mode some guns have.
That's all you needed to say. If autofire is a weapon mode (or even type, I guess) and Autofire is an action, that's both understandable and potentially confusing but it completely negates my argument - that Burstfire wouldn't reference Autofire and also contain all its rules (totally just power attack).
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Post by PhoneLobster »

DSMatticus wrote:This is not a thing that happened.
Put up or shut up. You are ignoring SOME CL guidelines on the basis of them not being "prohibitions" and yet following OTHER CL guidelines which are ALSO not "prohibtions" by your stupid argument.

You don't get to whine on about "I never admitted that was what I was doing!" your whole fucking argument hinges off it, it is the thing you did and are STILL trying to defend.

Either CL guidelines hold and when constructing encounters you follow them. Or CL guidelines that aren't hard rules are non binding and when constructing encounters you not only can ignore the Multiple Opponent guideline you can ALSO ignore the maximum CL guidelines and it isn't just 30 Storm troopers for a level 10 party, it can also be 30 rancors, 30 star destroyers or 30,000 storm troopers.

This is fucking simply applying YOUR reasoning on the multiple opponents text to the rest of the CL text.

If you want to cherry pick your rules text you wish to follow or not, you need a damn good excuse. You don't have one and so you are devolving into rage filled content free rants made of denials and accusations.

And hey, YOU pulled the "gish gallop" accusation repeatedly. So lets focus this down to this key claim that you don't have to follow the multiple opponent guidelines you've stupidly strapped your entire self worth to.

Man up, actually explain yourself for once, or GTFO off my thread.
Last edited by PhoneLobster on Mon Nov 10, 2014 12:51 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Post by PhoneLobster »

CatharzGodfoot wrote:Thanks PL. That was a good read. I needed more Saga hate in my life.

But please just stop trying to use apostrophes.
Thank's its good to know someone enjoyed the material.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

spongeknight wrote:Yeah, I'm siding with PL on this one. Saying that you shouldn't overwhelm players with huge amounts of characters because that is likely to kill them, and then simultaneously saying that evasion is necessary because huge amounts of mooks will kill you if you don't have evasion so evasion is necessary is just wrong. It's a circular argument starting with a false premise. If your GM doesn't toss lots of autohitting mooks at you, evasion is not worth anything. If your GM is throwing tons of autohitting mooks at you, he is specifically doing something the game rules warn him not to do. Your argument is literally "if the GM ignores the encounter building advice and does something that will probably kill you, then the one ability that counters that is important, therefore it is always important because all GMs will ignore the encounter building guidelines."

You might as well say that all character builds need to include buying a Star Destroyer because your GM throws a Star Destroyer at parties.
But that wasn't even Dean's real point. He picked 26 stormtroopers because that's the number of people it takes to one-shot Darth Vader, but as we know combat lasts multiple rounds and people can perform action in each round and some guns deal more damage than those wielded by normal stormtroopers. In this thread, Dean has also shown that Darth Vader loses to like 10 stormtroopers in a real fight as well.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
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Post by DSMatticus »

PL has responded to my challenge to prove that I said the things he is claiming I said by challenging me to prove that I didn't. I have something very serious to share with you all. I know a dark and sordid secret from PL's past, and now that we live in a world where evidentiary burdens are in fact inverted, I feel justified in coming forward despite my complete and total lack of evidence: PhoneLobster helped Gleen Beck rape and murder a young girl in 1990.

Everything in PhoneLobster's post is simply him repeating himself and fucking up the terminology in small but mostly irrelevant ways (he doesn't know what CL is, for example). The argument looks a lot like this:
1) The guidelines say "do not have encounters with more than a dozen opponents" (premise).
2) DSM says encounters with more than a dozen opponents are acceptable under the guidelines (premise).
3) DSM is ignoring part of the guidelines (by 1&2).
4) If you ignore parts of the guidelines, you cannot privilege other parts of the guidelines (premise).
5) DSM cannot privilege other parts of the guidelines (by 3&4).
6) DSM privileges other parts of the guidelines (premise).
7) DSM is inconsistent (by 5&6).

This is a valid argument. If the premises (which are 1, 2, 4, and 6) hold, then everything else follows right up to and including my position being inconsistent. So let's talk about the premises:
6) "DSM privileges other parts of the guidelines." I do. Premise holds.
4) "If you ignore parts of the guidelines, you cannot privilege other parts of the guidelines." No contest. Premise holds.
2) "DSM says encounters with more than a dozen opponents are acceptable under the guidelines." That is my claim. Premise holds.

And, finally:
1) "The guidelines say "do not have encounters with more than a dozen opponents.""

... Whether or not 1 is true is the entire fucking argument PL and are I having! PL is assuming that 1 is true in order to claim my position is inconsistent and declare victory; his argument literally (no, really, literally) assumes victory in order to declare victory.

My actual stated position is that 1 is false. It is false because "avoid X unless Y" is, by simple fucking English, not equivalent to "don't do X." And if those English sentences are not equivalent then 1 is not fucking true. And what happens if 1 isn't true? Then 3 does not follow. And if 3 does not follow, then 5 does not follow. And if 5 does not follow, then 7 does not follow.

PL must actually establish that 1 is true before he can use it as a premise and have his argument mean anything. And in order to establish 1 as true, he has to explain why "avoid coffee unless you're trying to stay awake" means "don't drink coffee." What he has actually done is assume that 1 is true, use that in an argument whose conclusion is my inconsistency, and then dismiss my arguments that 1 is false because of the inconsistency that arose from assuming 1 to be true! It's deceitful and circular.
Last edited by DSMatticus on Mon Nov 10, 2014 2:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by PhoneLobster »

DSMatticus wrote:PL has responded to my challenge to prove that I said the things he is claiming
I didn't even bother, you flat out challenged me to say when you said it then basically repeated the fucking thing you claimed you never said directly after it.

Your thin veneer of the "guidelines don't say I CAN'T they just tell me it's bad!" is fucking stupid. And you keep repeating it and pretending it isn't what you are saying.

Your entire last post, AGAIN, was a repetition of your whining on that you don't HAVE to follow guidelines with NO defense of what that philosophy does when you encounter every other fucking CL guideline in the game.

So. Instead of providing an honest defense you opted for "GTFO of my thread". Fine, fuck off and don't come back, I don't even want to see a reply because it will just be more repetitive content free denials and accusations like EVERYTHING you've posted, you've shitted all over a perfectly adequate and fun review with your "the rules text doesn't MEAN anything man!" bullshit and I've had enough of it.
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Post by DSMatticus »

PL wrote:Your thin veneer of the "guidelines don't say I CAN'T they just tell me it's bad!" is fucking stupid. And you keep repeating it and pretending it isn't what you are saying.

Your entire last post, AGAIN, was a repetition of your whining on that you don't HAVE to follow guidelines with NO defense of what that philosophy does when you encounter every other fucking CL guideline in the game.
DSM wrote:My actual stated position is that 1 is false. It is false because "avoid X unless Y" is, by simple fucking English, not equivalent to "don't do X." And if those English sentences are not equivalent then 1 is not fucking true. And what happens if 1 isn't true? Then 3 does not follow. And if 3 does not follow, then 5 does not follow. And if 5 does not follow, then 7 does not follow.
DSM wrote: You have presented the argument that when a line of text says "avoid drinking coffee unless you're trying to stay awake" "avoid encounters with more than a dozen opponents unless you want the heroes to feel overwhelmed" it actually means "never drink coffee" "never have encounters with more than a dozen opponents."

I have rejected the notion that "don't do X unless you want Y" means "never do X," and instead means "you could do X if you wanted Y".
Well, you're right that this is going nowhere. It's just the same fucking lie over and over and over and over about how I don't have an argument even as I provide the exact argument you are calling for over and over and over and over and you ignore it each and every single time. Your review is over and this argument is clearly over and there is no further reason to leave you off ignore. Back on you go and as requested I'm out.
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Post by PhoneLobster »

DSMatticus wrote:Your review is over
Well, no, if you'd paid any attention in between shitting your brains out over how you totally get to ignore CL guidelines only whenever it is convenient for your bullshit claims, you may have noticed that the review of the core book is over. Thanks to your whole "but one of the splat books might be THE TOMES OF SAGA EDITION!!!" brain fart I may yet have more work to do!

I'm making no commitments, but it's really worth noting the review of this edition remains open ended for now.
...and there is no further reason to leave you off ignore.
And if ONLY you could manage to keep that promise THIS time, unlike say the LAST several times you've petulantly pulled it out after losing an argument.
Last edited by PhoneLobster on Mon Nov 10, 2014 3:33 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by PhoneLobster »

Anyway, come to think of it. In the vein of the review not entirely being over...

I have been thinking the way I would cover the splat books would be something like several pages on each covering the topics of "What is it supposed to fix?", "Does It Fix those things?", "What new options does it introduce?" and "Crazy dumb stuff it did in the mean time".

What I have been unable to decide is how many splat books to cover and in what order of priority.

I could, eventually, cover them all, in any order.

But I think it might be best to just ask if anyone has any particular interest in specific splats or indeed if anyone even has ANY interest in further splat coverage at all?
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Post by spongeknight »

PhoneLobster wrote:Anyway, come to think of it. In the vein of the review not entirely being over...

I have been thinking the way I would cover the splat books would be something like several pages on each covering the topics of "What is it supposed to fix?", "Does It Fix those things?", "What new options does it introduce?" and "Crazy dumb stuff it did in the mean time".

What I have been unable to decide is how many splat books to cover and in what order of priority.

I could, eventually, cover them all, in any order.

But I think it might be best to just ask if anyone has any particular interest in specific splats or indeed if anyone even has ANY interest in further splat coverage at all?
I've heard from a few people that the martial arts splatbook and/or the expanded martial arts materials make unarmed guys viable in a system where jedi deflect guns and everyone else has guns. I assume that's all bullshit from the stupid abilities people get in the core book, so that's at least one thing you could do.
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Post by Silent Wayfarer »

I found the vitriol entertaining.
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Post by Korwin »

fbmf wrote:DSM, Dean, and others: I understand that, with Evasion, PL's example was skewed to prove his point and you've got him on that.

Multi classing? PL says it sucks, and Insomniac ( and Korwin) says it doesn't. PL is talking about rules. Korwin starts talking about house rules to fix multi classing while claiming multi lasting doesn't suck. Insomniac just says PL is wrong but doesn't bother to offer any support for that idea.

Game On,
fbmf
Clarification:
Multiclassing is not working if you want to use all classes with medium BAB in one single build.
Multiclassing is still good, if you use your brain while multiclassing (or your build does'nt need the BAB).

Multiclassing is better if you use an HR.
Some (not me) might say, too good...
Red_Rob wrote: I mean, I'm pretty sure the Mayans had a prophecy about what would happen if Frank and PL ever agreed on something. PL will argue with Frank that the sky is blue or grass is green, so when they both separately piss on your idea that is definitely something to think about.
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Post by darkmaster »

I would read a review of the ship book.
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Fuck you Haruhi is clearly the best moe anime, and we will argue about how Haruhi and Nagato are OP and um... that girl with blond hair? is for shitters.

If you like Lucky Star then I will explain in great detail why Lucky Star is the a shitty shitty anime for shitty shitty people, and how the characters have no interesting abilities at all, and everything is poorly designed especially the skill challenges.
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Post by Neurosis »

It is essential to the future of the den that 'X Shakes the Angry Fist at Y' become the naming convention used for all future drunken/OSSR reviews.

Because intellectual honesty.
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Post by TiaC »

Schwarzkopf wrote:It is essential to the future of the den that 'X Shakes the Angry Fist at Y' become the naming convention used for all future drunken/OSSR reviews.

Because intellectual honesty.
Sometimes it's more "X Shakes Head in Deep Disappointment at Y". Like the Kindred of the Ebony Kingdom thread is less rage and more "How could they possibly be this clueless?"
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