#Homerule it.

[y-rhywbeth2]

I had a question about Faerun magic lore, specifically in how it relates to sorcerors and wizards!

So, I know that wizards have to study their spells and memorize them EVERY time they want to cast a particular spell because once they’ve cast it, the act of using magic is basically so exhausting that they forget how to use that spell until they’ve studied it again. Whereas my understanding of sorceror is that they basically always know how to cast their spells/the knowledge of the gestures and incantations never leave their memory.

So my question is, how it work for a sorceror to multiclass into a wizard, lore wise? Because theoretically if they’re smart enough and try hard enough, anyone can become a wizard, right? So how would remembering spells work for a sorcerer who decided to actually STUDY magic and spells like wizards do? Would they need to study these spells EVERY time they wanted to cast them like wizards do, or would they be able to retain the memory of these new spells bc they have an innate ability to use magic as sorcerors?

Bc atm im kinda leaning towards the notion of sorcerors only being able to remember the spells that are like, related to their sorcery origin? Like a shadow sorceror could cast evocative spells after studying them but would have to study them for each cast but would be able to retain the memory of their necromancy spells with no issues bc their magic comes from the shadowfell and negative energy. But idk if there’s really any actual in lore basis for that

Ah, crunch vs fluff. Mechanics were never my forte, but I can give an opinion based on what I know/have interpreted from what I know. I'm not going to be surprised if Sorcerers vs Wizards: Realmslore Edition has come up in a novel somewhere that I haven't read.

I can answer this bit though:

Because theoretically if they’re smart enough and try hard enough, anyone can become a wizard, right?

No. Not in the Realms, from what I recall. On Toril the ability to use magic - the life force of the universe, apparently - is intended to be innate, even for wizards.

The core similarity in mages is the inherent ability to interact with and shape the Weave. The core difference of spellcasters in the Realms is in how they interact the Weave. Different arcane classes are using totally different paradigms to each other.

You can get the Gift from inheriting it from your family lineage, and sometimes you just pick it up like some sort of superhero origin from all the ambient magic and various shenanigans that Toril is full of. If you don't have it, no amount of studying will do anything.

(And then sometimes you don't get the full Gift from exposure to magic, not enough to be a mage, but 'one for every thousand-and-a-half' of the total population develop one or two innate magical abilities like clairvoyance, turning into a tree at will, walking on water, levitation, the ability to cast time stop, or whatever. On a similar level, wizards don't need to memorise cantrips (in 5e), they can just cast them at will.)

Wizards are mortals with the Gift, and with training learn to form pathways in the Weave through which to channel and shape magic to their will using established formula, binding them into the form of spells, and etc. Azuth is credited for a wizard's ability to learn and use spells (after Mystra, who allows them to access magic via the Weave).

Sorcerers have a scrap of something in them that isn't quite human, usually genetics/blood from something that is innately magical - dragons, fey, gods, devils, etc. Inherently magical beings. Cowards who fear the legacy of dragon-fucking have also recently added the possibility it's an exterior supernatural force that changes them. But traditionally it's because grandad was a 2000 year old 12ft tall fire-breathing magic cat-like lizard. As their powers grow it tends to change them into something more (draconic sorcerers often slowly transforming into half-dragons, for example) As far as I'm aware they learn shapes for magic to form based on a combination of instinct and trial and error and sometimes help from an older spellcaster (or maybe a dragon, or something).

While wizards need the Weave to memorise/assimilate pre-made spells, sorcerers rely on the Weave to 'recharge' spent energy. Apparently.

(According to Ed Greenwood, if the Weave - which is the gateway by which mortals can interact with magic - was forever removed then elves, dragons, sorcerers and warlocks (or rather, their patrons) would still have magic, they'd just need to relearn a whole new paradigm of existence to start using it again and find themselves to be different than they were before, in some fashion. Wizards and bards, who didn't get mentioned, are apparently out of luck in this hypothetical new post-apocalyptic world.)

Would they need to study these spells EVERY time they wanted to cast them like wizards do, or would they be able to retain the memory of these new spells bc they have an innate ability to use magic as sorcerors? Bc atm im kinda leaning towards the notion of sorcerors only being able to remember the spells that are like, related to their sorcery origin? Like a shadow sorceror could cast evocative spells after studying them but would have to study them for each cast but would be able to retain the memory of their necromancy spells with no issues bc their magic comes from the shadowfell and negative energy.

Mechanics suggest no, unless you use levelling up to change your spell list and add the wizard spells they studied, or add them when you unlock them level up. Wizardry is wizardry: Sorcery is sorcery, it seems.

Mechanically a wizard learns by memorising scrolls (studying the magic, writing it in their spellbook and then assimilating it on days when they plan to use it), a sorcerer can make and use scrolls but not memorise them (they don't know how to assimilate spells like wizards do, they just do magic).

Since a sorcerer and a wizard are engaging with the Weave in totally different ways and from entirely different starting points, I would imagine the sorcerer would need to engage in wizardry as something inherently separate from their innate abilities. Like knowing how to ride a horse isn't knowing how to drive a car, even if both forms of transport get you to your destination.

[dimension-20-every-introduction]

Everyone Introduced in Dimension 20′s The Ravening War episode 1

[zevranunderstander]

we recently played a bloodborne oneshot and i just wanted to upload my character designs for the player characters here :)

[greyeisacreativecolor]

Hey you! Yeah, the one scrolling through rpg tumblr looking at memes! Do you want character art? Or maybe to posess the power of dragons at your next game? Or, how about building your own flesh golem? Or even taking some of the annoying math out of building an undead army?

Well, do I have the shop for you! Go to my ko-fi, please, I'm desperate enough to do this silly promo!

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[barkrocks]

so sad that this is the last season of d20 brennan will ever dm

[dare-to-dm]

Top 5 homerules you've come up with for 5e

I've never run a 5e game. Please accept my top 5 homerules for Pathfinder, some of which could be altered for use in 5e.

Spell DCs are based on the highest level spell you can cast.

Normally, the save DC for a spell is 10+spellcasting ability modifier+level of the spell. But this means that there are a lot of 1st level spells that really lose their utility over time. Allowing the DC of all spells to go up as you gain in power let's those lower level spells still shine without really changing things too dramatically. Opponents with really high Wisdom Saves and spell resistance aren't going to be bothered anyway.

2. Rolling a 1 on a skill check is an automatic failure.

Normally in Pathfinder, critical fails are only a thing for attacks. But I don't like the idea of anyone getting to a point where they don't even need to roll the dice for important checks. So even if you have +30 to whatever the check is, there's still a chance you could fail, if only through bad luck.

3. Drinking a healing potion as a full round action will get you the maximum hit points.

It sucks when you drink a healing potion and only get like 4 hitpoints back because you rolled 1s. Especially since you paid good money for that potion! I feel like if you take the time to drink the potion carefully you should be able to get your money's worth.

4. Don't sweat the small stuff when it comes to inventory management

This is less of a house rule and more of a philosophy. But I just don't really need to be micromanaging basic inventory stuff with my players. I assume the spellcasters are refreshing their spell components whenever possible and archers are keeping tabs on their ammo and everyone is topping up their rations. Unless the PCs are in a situation which would make it particularly difficult to do these things for an extended period of time, I'm not going to bother them about it. I also don't really care about carrying capacity as long as we're not dealing with anything ridiculously large. Oh, and currency is weightless.

5. Players can opt for tactical initiative instead of traditional initiative

By tactical initiative, I mean that rather than rolling to see what order people act in, the players take their actions in any order that they want, until all actions are spent. I've tried this a few times in the past, and it's gone well. In some situations it's actually easier than a traditional initiative and allows for more flexibility. But I would only recommend it for groups that are well acquainted with the mechanics and don't struggle with decision making.

[thydungeongal]

Is it considered like, rude to publish games that are made up of discernable parts of other games? Especially when it's about something indie.

I just think that I may post my homeruled version of one game with stitched oracles and magic from another one, but I dunno is it problematic

I'm not an authority on this, but there's a few things to keep in mind:

Many designers have gotten their start as designers by iterating what has come before. There are many many games out there where you can easily discern the design lineage to multiple other games.

From a legal standpoint, as it's been explained to me, game mechanics do not fall under copyright, but the artistic presentation might. But I am not a lawyer and there is probably a lot of nuance to this.

Remixing games is, like, nothing new, but I think it's always worth it to be candid about your inspirations and maybe not steal their voice. For an example, people have pretty much reproduced all of AD&D 1e's rules text in the form of the retroclone OSRIC, and one thing they do is that they don't even try to copy Gygax's purple prose and instead write in a way that can be understood.

But yeah idk, there's probably a lot of nuance to this. If you're unsure I think it's best to ask the designers themselves how they would feel. At least by my understanding most indie designers are cool with that sort of thing. And it's also possible that they already have a license for reproducing parts of their game.

[szhmidty]

In the vein of pure speculation:

I think one of the problems with DnD discourse is that a lot of people like the aesthetic of simulation but not actually /doing/ simulation. They want DnD to be "just like real life" where you can do "anything you can think of" and have the rules neatly account for that, without realizing or considering the actual burden that level of simulation places on the players and (more so) the GM.

3.5E was strongly simulation based, but in a kinda silly way that easily broke if you took it seriously, so players were required to put in a lot of effort for a very silly result.

4E ditched simulation pretty strongly, and players hated it. Too video-gamey, despite being closer to how players tended to actually play.

5E tries desperately to straddle the line between simulation and actually just being straight-fowardly playable without too much investment. It ends up being massively popular, carried by the reputation of "you can do anything" even as players sand down the edges to make it even smoother and more incoherent.

The problem with "play another game" is that, aside from lacking the cache of being called DnD, other games (at least the recommended ones in this discourse, usually) are coherently designed, and a coherent design either has you performing flexural stress/strain calculations to determine the ballistic behaviour of your recurved oak hunting bow, or it doesn't allow for "you can do anything" because accounting for any possible player action actually isn't feasible.

The point of all the fiddly rules that people ignore in DnD isn't to actually play them, it's to sell the player on the lie of "this is basically real life with dragons". Players want to be lied to, and they're willing to graft half a games worth of homerules onto 5Es bloated corpse to keep the lie going.

[continent-of-wild-endeavor]

Latest silly D&D character idea is

Magical Girl (w/transformation)

Now I need to go watch some Sailor Moon etc to really get the vibe, if I want to implement this in an actual game, but J and I decided the best/easiest way to do this is as an Armorer Artificer. The Arcane Armor can be any type, and expands to cover your entire body -> useful protection/effects when in fighting mode. Rules as written say you can raise or lower the helmet portion as a bonus action, so we just need to homerule that you can expand/retract the whole thing instead, and then be dramatic about the transformation scene. Music? Prestidigitation.

There's other ways to do this, such as being a Druid & playing with Wild Shape (gets you an animal companion easily too), or a Monk route, but this one seems fun, and I've never been an artificer, so far. Lots of fun opportunities for magic items, & to figure out what spells feel right.

J suggested she be a hobgoblin, to increase comedic effect.

Sailor Moon herself, btw, is clearly a sorcerer (bloodline/genetic source of power), and her crew would fundamentally be warlocks, with her as their patron.

[schraubd]

Even Friendly Dominance Is Still Dominance

For some reason, a slew of congressional Democrats (along with President Joe Biden), most whom purport to support DC statehood -- most of whom I think genuinely support DC statehood -- voted to overturn the DC government's recent alterations to its criminal code.

This was a foolish decision, not the least because you give the GOP and inch and it takes a mile on these things.

But in its way, it demonstrates exactly why DC needs statehood.

The simple fact is that no matter how warm or empathetic any particular national politician feels towards DC, they cannot be trusted to govern DC insofar as they are not elected by DC voters. That's the entire point of democracy -- that our representatives are chosen by us, and so gain the legitimacy to write laws on our behalf. If DC were a state then normal, local lawmaking about DC would be undertaken by politicians accountable to DC voters. That doesn't mean all their choices will be good or salutary, but DC residents have the same right to make what some might deem to be mistaken policy choices as Kentucky or Idaho or Maine voters.

And the setup that DC has now -- with putative home rule, but subject to the oversight and approval of Congress -- will never substitute for actual home rule. Even men and women who think of themselves as DC supporters, who have naught but fair-feeling towards the people of DC, will be unable to resist the allure of substituting their own judgment for those of the actual DC polity. Whether because of strong feelings on a given issue or simply the happenstance of political maneuvering, those who have the power to dominant will exercise that power.

So long as Congress has the special power to override DC home rule, it will exercise that power -- it does not ultimately matter how "friendly" the individual Senators and Representatives are. The only way to end that is to give DC true, actual homerule on the same terms as any other American jurisdiction -- that is to say, by statehood.

(And yes, the same applies for all the American colonies).

via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/CgV8I05

[y-rhywbeth2]

I don't think playing an instrument should be restricted to bards (because in BG3 apparently any non-bards can never play), and while I'm at it I'm pretty sure perform should be a dexterity based skill in some cases - sure stage presence is a thing, but rhythm and playing keys and multitasking with your hands is a coordination thing. Acting can easily go under deception/persuasion/intimidation. Dance is athletics/acrobatics.

Bards of course channel their magic through music, so they get a whole host of things out of perform that non-bards don't, but the ability to simply play the lute hardly requires a full bardic education.

The problem does exist with singing and maybe woodwind and brass, which arguably are constitution based activities due to breath control and blah (does stuff like pitch control and mouth shape fall under dex? hmm...). I mean, DnD is not that deep a simulator, but still.

[boxxe-of-friends]

Proposal of new rules to go alongside "rule of cool"

Background

I like TTRPGS. I play multiple different systems and I'm a fan of a lot of different types. Currently I'm digging my teeth into pathfinder 2e for the first time and digging up some old gems to get a better understanding of the hobbies history. This is to say i have played and ran more than my fair share and this is not a post about a specific system, though rule of cool is most commonly associated with dnd.

Proposal

I think there should be 2 new rules that go alongside "The rule of Cool" (R1 from here on out bc im lazy)

"The rule of Camp"

"The rule of Calm"

Adopting these ideas as a player or game runner serves to reward a broader style of play that will cover a greater number of players to feel seen and rewarded and reenforce diverse playstyles at different tables.

Also, they all start with C.

Thesis

The current state of play that R1 enforces by existing in isolation means that the table is rewarded for actions that are "Cool". As a phrase, this leans itself toward actions that are high energy, bold, and chaotic, but is still poorly defigned, leaving things to the gamerunner to pick where that line is as after all this is a homerule that got lovingly adopted.

The issue this poses when this rule is played in isolation is that the scope of rewarded actions are narrow, and they ultimately support a specific type of playstyle. The actions this rule supports take the spotlight and often subvert or change an entire scene when successful but also put significant emphasis on the player as a centre of attention.

The thing is, there are many different ways to achieve similar effects that should also be rewarded but they are not cool. This is where the other two rules would come in. By adpoting these rules, gamerunners are actively saying, "I support this style of play." This creates an environment where different players feel as though they can express themselves in a manner that fits a broader spectrum of ways to roleplay and interact with story.

The rule of Camp

Camp is the best word i could think of for the range of ideas covered here. Camp is what happens when an idea is taken to its highest point, elevated, and then commited to with a full chest. The rule of Camp (or R2) takes its effect when a player takes something to its highest point or most ridiculous place but plays it with 100% commitment. Better yet 120%.

Camp is where silly and serious meet without nullifying each other. It is camp to make the plan hinge on the barbarian wearing a wedding dress fool a powerful giant into thinking they are the woman they were supposed to marry (thanks norse mythology). It is camp for a goblin artificer to live to all their chaos and fake out an NPC by making something elegant and refigned for a gallery.

These moments often happen in our TTRPGs. Whatever the theme is, they are presented in different ways, and they mean different things to different tables, but they still subvert the narrative by playing into the energy of tropes and expectation and clever use of this should be rewarded, giving these plans a chance to work the same way the impossible swing from the top rigging of tje pirateship to cleave the captain in half would be cool.

The rule of Calm

Sometimes, the low energy or emotional plays are the most impactful ones in a session. This awknoledgement of those moments and playing off them rewards people for digging into their characters or having a very good understanding of the story and using it well.

What's left unsaid? When is it the right time to not say anything and let the moment breathe? Where does the moment go from here ? How can you dig deeper?

All of those examples are the calm way of thinking about story, the indulgence of the beats and pauses that when the right question is asked, the best thing said or the most impactful silence is left something needs to be done to honour the moment.

The rule of calm (or R3) is the one that comes up the least often, but i find it to have great weight. This narritive recognition of respect is what makes the story better overall because you cant have the highs without the lows.

This would take a form that respects the moment and plays back into the moment being had, something going unheard by a flock of birds taking off at the wrong time or a chance to get a deeper insight into something otherwise hidden.

Conclusion

Partially, this is a discussion opener about what moments are honoured at your tables and what tone is portrayed in doing that. What kind of players is it supporting? Is there something more impactful for your table?

I want to see how other people feel about the idea and where they stand on how they would honour different plays .

[lordofthetwistedflies]

OKAY BUT THIS ACTUALLY WORKS SO WELL???

Especially since I have a homerule that you can cast spells beyond your spell slot limit, but you take a level of exhaustion per slot per level.

i don't like spoon theory. i like spell slots. sometimes showering is a level i spell. sometimes it's upcast to a level iii spell. working out is always a level iv spell or higher. playing a video game is a cantrip. i get spell slots back after a short rest but there are once per long rest things on my list, like doing a grocery shop. etc.

[redlilyadventuringcompany]

Some 1974 Homerules/Working on a Homegrown "OSR" System Part 1: Ancestries

One of my recent home projects has been working on converting the 1974 rules to a 1d100 roll under percentile system to work as the underpinnings for my homegrown “OSR” system. The first part of this has been relatively easily, take every value that operates on a base 20 and multiply it by five. Then make a list of all of the ancestry options and classes. There ya go, at least a quarter of the…

[hawaiiancoolwater]

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[y-rhywbeth2]

The concept that Banite healing spells might do fuck all to help or save you depending on how Bane personally feels about your continued existence amuses me, and I might incorporate it into a homerule.

Dreadmaster: 'Lord Bane, I request your aid healing this fool.' Bane: 'No. Torture him to death and take his stuff instead.'

Also I don't know if there's official information about whether healing spells can hurt, but if they can I know Bane will make them a bitch to endure. (Loviatar's might be more painful, but on the other hand she can be soothing and into aftercare to make the next injury hurt more... hmm.)