#the cast DO in fact play DND TWICE

[nevertem]

[owlbear33]

Right Then version 2

this is a revision of the single-use item wizards thing from yesterday

the idea for this whole thing came from a discussion I had (I don't remember where or with whom) about the fact that old dnd magic users basically depend on magic items for most of their spellcasting, they don't get a lot of spells because they're meant to be using scrolls and wands and the like

and like so many things I don't think this element of play is adequately presented by the rules, so why not make all magic item magic

the aim of this homebrew is to turn spellcasting into a downtime action, a magic user builds up a stock of prepared spells, which they then take adventuring, they might also find prepared spells on their adventures

the two major changes are that you shouldn't have to make a spellcasting check twice for the same spell, and only a mage gets to tell a misbehaving spell to behave itself

--

this is a modular magic system for D20-based dungeon games it requires a pre-existing magic system with spells leveled 1-9

do away with spell slots

Spellcasting requires access to a written script for the spell

those who use magic may have access to a spell book containing these scripts and gain knowledge of these scripts as though they were spells in the usual manner

casting spells is a ritual action taking an hour per level of the spell plus any usual spellcasting components or action

casting spells takes a spellcasting check of 10 plus the spell level

the spell activates (causing whatever effect) at the end of the ritual

alternatively, a spellcasting check of 11 plus the spell level can produce a single-use magic item that can be stored for later use

(fluff what the item is as appropriate, suggestions: break to use spell tablets, a section of knotted rope, a small sealed jar)

the spellcasting DC can be increased in small intervals for anything that might cause difficulty casting

failure means that the time and any spell components consumed by the spell are wasted

how many spells you can cast is only limited by time and access to materials, the ability to cast spells may be limited by level at GM discretion

_

Using single-use spell items (SUSI)

using a SUSI requires an action

if the character did not create the SUSI then a spellcasting check is also required DC 8 plus the spell level

if the check is failed then the spell goes awry if the character is able to cast spells then they may try and control the spell failure, making a check DC 1 plus the spell level

success means the spell fizzles and does nothing rather than going awry

increase the spell control DC in situations where magic may wish to misbehave, such as in the presence of antimagic zones or entities, the spell not being on a spell list you have access to, or not knowing with spell

[thewinedarksea]

can you elaborate on your lantern dnd class?? sounds intriguing

:DDD i most definitely can!

as a quick note: while this class is stable in combat, and was made with a close attention to numbers (ty anna, queen of mechanics), this is not a professional class and so the balance is almost certainly off and i know this--it's a fun class to play in a series of interconnected one-shots. also, not something to try at home unless you and your dm have a good grasp of mechanics; we did not make this up arbitrarily and it does take a solid amount of work to execute it.

under the cut bc i am delightedly rambling.

some backstory for the class: anna & i have created a shared dnd world that plays both with the established setting of 5e and a lot of our own, personal lore (the document is....horrifyingly long). one of the concepts that anna created was that of a divine city--a city that embodied, however we chose to interpret that, its god. there are 7; 5 official and 2 unofficial. of those, one of them is emporia.

emporia was my own creation, one of the unofficial divine cities. it is essentially a city where gods go to not die; a city where worshippers and wanderers and wonderers congregate; a city of wreckage and rubble built into something new and mostly alive and only somewhat dead.

it is embodied in the lanterned god (also known as the lighted king, the shopkeeper, god-guarder, he that gathers prayers, the undying wick). the lanterned god stores every god that comes into emporia in a lantern in his shop and keeps watch over them. this is not great for many of the gods! they would like to Live and to live means to be Worshipped and they cannot do that when the latnerned god is keeping them close and fast. (he is not a particularly kind god. covetous, though? oh yes.)

in canon, my pc, ori, apprentice to this god, crept into his shop one night and stole away 7 gods to place back into the world. thus the name. she is the only one of her class, and the first.

anyways!

mechanically, the lantern-bearer is based on a monk class (specifically way of the sun soul). so that's how you get your base stats + access to armored defense + extra attack abilities beginning at 5th level. we also gave ori light bolt (her staff is where she equips lanterns and is her only melee attack weapon). spellcaster rules do apply: you can't cast twice. because her gods are always with her, we also drew from the path of the ancestors barbarian subclass. this gives access to spirit shield, consult the gods, divine intervention*, and vengeful gods at higher levels.

*fun fact about divine intervention: as it is a d8, each slot is corresponded to one of the 7 gods ori stole, and the 8th is tied to the lanterned god himself. when a god is placed, the slot corresponding to them becomes vacant; essentially, the more ori does her job, the harder this feature is to use successfully.

so monk base, ancestors flavoring. for spells, though, it's pure cleric. ori is *not*, to be clear, a cleric to the gods she carries; if anything, she would be one for the lanterned god, as he is the only god she truly worships.

while she has a god equipped, she has access to their domain spell lists--not *cleric* spells, only the ones that are tied to their domain. she can only have one god equipped at a time, and can only change gods 3-4 times per long rest. changing gods (and, thus, domains) is a bonus action. i had gods from the tempest, grave, twilight, nature, trickery, and life domains, but that can differ. she also is granted divine strike when fighting with her staff and access to channel divinity (radiance of the lantern).

this class, while very powerful at lower-levels, is actually designed with a major handicap in terms of character progression! as you place gods out, you lose access to their slots--thus, the higher level you get, the *less* you have to work with (if you're doing your job right). ori has currently placed out 3 gods, leaving her down her most powerful damage domain (tempest) and a good supporting domain (grave). (first god was placed prior to campaign start and thus has no assigned domain.)

it's wildly fun to play and so heavily rooted in in-game lore and worldbuilding that it is 100% up my alley.

this is a brief overview, and i am more than happy to talk about the class more! i'm very fond of ori and the world she inhabits.

[neveragainfools]

Okay this is wordy, but I’ve been thinking a lot about this because I had a negative gut reaction to the Dimension 20 teaser and I wanted to figure out why. I’ve got nothing against Matt Mercer as a person, and while I’m not a fan of his DM style, it’s not necessarily bad, so what is the reason?

I think a lot of D20 fans are people who’ve tried to get into Critical Role, but couldn’t do it for one reason or another. For me it’s that both him and the cast take everything Very Seriously and it feels like nothing moves forward in their 3-4 hour, twice a week, 100+ ep per campaign shows, but that said, I’ve only seen about an hour and a half of one episode, because it just wasn’t holding my attention. Maybe it’s better than I give credit for. Dimension 20 on the other hand, no matter what the season, maintains an energy that leans into the fact that everyone present is a bunch of theatre nerds playing a silly game. Even their high-lethality political intrigue season was essentially set in Candyland. I can’t speak for everyone, but I know for me, having the Serious Man come DM the silly show wrecks the vibes. (I think we could also talk about the two shows representing the fundamental divide between people’s general play styles, but that’s another post)

This is also something that I haven’t seen mentioned, but think it might be worth saying. When Matt was a PC on Escape the Bloodkeep, he kind of backseat DM’d, and hogged the spotlight whenever he was present in scenes. His trademark super in-depth describing style is fine if you’re the DM and what you’re saying is canon, but when you’re describing an action you’d like to do in third person as if it already worked out perfectly and start shaping the story ahead of the DM, it comes off as rude. I don’t think it was his intention - I mean the man does so much DMing any given week, I can see how it’d be hard to switch out of that mode. But other DMs play at the table all the time (Aabria, Omar, Murph to name a few), and they leave space for the DM to do their job, and play in their characters instead of outside of them, if that makes sense. I can’t speak to whether he was like this in Pirates of Leviathan, because I saw he was a cast member and didn’t watch it.

Sure there’s petty stuff too like CR is more popular, has a TV show, loud fandom, kind of feels unavoidable in the DnD space etc. That’s always gonna breed some hate, warranted or not. But I think what it truly comes down to is an inflexibility to enter the dome and match tone. A lot of D20 fans who weren’t already McElroy fans really disliked the Tiny Heist side quest for similar reasons. All this gets boiled down into “beef” I think.

okay boys why do we have beef with Matt Mercer??? I’m new in town

[maid-of-the-golden-deer]

the dnd movie was SO mediocre that it was unable to hide the fact that it exemplified every social ill in holywood

white leading man has a dead wife, with the added spice of her being a black woman, so the child he can neglect yet earn the respect of by the is end is mixed race this time

that mixed race kid (no disrespect to the young actress btw theres no right way to look/be biracial/non white but it was clearly a deliberate choice in this circumstance) was also very fair skinned despite having darker skin as a baby??

the warrior lady, who is the only LIVING woc in the film, got all the cool fight scenes but her only characterization was "likes surrogate daughter" "supports white male lead" "is stupid when not in fight" and "jokes about how she likes small men". like id prefer the movie be about her and not sad man with dead wife no.one billion

the druid lady existed PURELY as utility and as an external reward for simon (props for him having the only name i could remember lmao) to have his arc. her backstory, which hints at and involves a systematic/larger oppression and trauma is brought up like, Twice. she literally could have been an inanimate object considering all she did was be Practically Useful and had basically no characterization besides "strong morals"

simon definitely had the most interesting arc but it was still playing into "black man struggles for the attention of a white woman who has the moral high ground on him" and he needs the encouragement of the white male lead to do any of his personal growth

the paladin guy was absolutely the best part of the movie but spent most of his painfully short screentime encouraging the one white guy instead of ANY of the other characters and was not in the film nearly enough

tldr: diverse casts are awesome and we need more of them but also like. when theyre just there to prop up and further the story of your typical white cishet male lead isnt not making progress so much as giving short sided people ammunition to tell you to stop complaining

also like it was just bland and uninspired. i know dnd is the foundation for genric fantasy but come on. there wasnt ANYTHING interesting to add???

[clockworklozenges]

So, a good five or so years back, I played in one of the best worst DnD games I have ever been in. The DM had bought the Libris Mortis book, which, if you were unaware, was a 3.5 splatbook adding in a lot of undead stuff, including some monsters and undead player races and stuff. Wanting to try it out, me and my gaming group decided to play things from it, our then DM deciding to run a completely homebrewed session. This proved to be a...

Terrible Idea™

(for the uninitiated, never homebrew something you do not fully understand unless it's just cosmetic. If you want to make all elves worship the god of garlic bread, Ultimo-Metatron-Omega, go ahead, but unless you know how the game works, don't make mechanical changes). So we all picked stuff from the books-one player played a skeleton Sorcerer who in life was a tribal shaman, but an attempt at healing went wrong, turning him undead as his life energy was replaced with negative energy, explaining why most of his spells were necromancy and suchlike.

Another player played Krug, an antipaladin in very spiky full plate. He was a zombie made by a necromancer of a paladin who was fighting him, but his allies killed his would-be master before he could assert control, and not wanting to just off him, his allies just...yeeted his body into a portal and hoped it'd re-kill him. It did not kill him hard enough. It did, however, explain his stats which...oof. He had already got debuffs to some stats due to being a zombie, and rolled abysmally. Fortunately for the player, he played mostly to socialise, so didn't much care.

I played... Count Nox Feratu, the Campire. As in, a vampire with a very camp German accent, which I did not break for the whole time I was playing him. To the point where "ach, nein, I haf bin heet! Heal me, meine freunde!" was par for the course. My overly camp vamp was a wizard, but due to level adjustment was a bit of a shoddy one. For backstory, he'd been ousted from his clan for ineptitude, and had sworn revenge. I was going for a swordmage build but never got there. All his spells were utility or just necromancy spells.

Our last player played...sigh...Damien Bloodmoon, cleric of Nerull, God of murder and undeath. He was one of the clerics from the book's murder Domain, meaning that he got buffs to damage. He was a vicious arse both in character and out of it, and was so dripping with edge compared to the paladin with the same IQ as a horse after its trip to the glue factory, the shaman who thought killing fixed people and the Campire that if you gave him a pat on the back you'd have finely diced your hand into a red mist. Not going too outlandish with his backstory of wanting to dominate the world as his undead thralls, Damien F***ing Bloodmoon had only taken spells which either charmed live people, dealt negative energy damage or messed with ability drain and suchlike, which he used with aplomb on townsfolk on our way to our objective. He was also, importantly, playing an elf of some sort, I forget which kind. Meaning that of the party, only one was alive.

So, just as an aside, for those of you that haven't played 3.5e DnD or have only played 5e, in Libris Mortis, undeath was gone over in detail, and had a litany of pros and cons. For one thing, undead had only the HP they had-folks like Damien F***ing Bloodmoon could be 'dying', and had some time to be stabilised before meeting the reckoning of Papa John and dying proper. Undead did not, it was just how much you had and if you ran out, poof, you're dust, bones and fertiliser again. You were also harmed by positive energy, so healing spells hurt you, as did potions of healing. However, undead were kind of hardy - poison immunity, some had resistance to non-magical melee damage, stuff that drained your ability scores and levels didn't work on them, some crits wouldn't do extra damage, and the best part- negative energy healed undead. Meaning all the spells our party had which damaged others like the living Damien Bloodmoon were curative ones for us. Keep this in mind.

So, we began our quest, learning of a necromancer a nearby town was plagued by. After using our skills (to whit: Damien Bloodmoon charming and drawing the life force out of random villagers and the only potion seller in the town whilst we went shopping. Krug got a snazzy hat, which we put on top of his helmet, and we chatted to townsfolk as I looked alive enough to pass as human and the shaman had a fake beard and toupee that people were too awkward to point out was fake so went along with it) we learn that the necromancer has a base of operations in the cemetery. "Oh ja, zo original, dahlink. Ve vill need to educate zis guy on vhat is chic and vhat is just shabby!"

So we head there and the nightmare begins. Damien Leads the charge, using all of his knowledge to deduce that the shambling horde moving towards us were stronger-than-your-average-bear undead, and he was right. These were powerful armoured zombie mages of some sort, casting ability draining spells, negative energy ray spells and even having auras of negative energy that dealt damage on a failed Fortitude save. Even their punch and quarterstaves did negative energy damage as well as the usual bludgeoning or unarmed. However...only one of us was really in danger and the DM's face fell when the squishy casters walked up and began shanking their super-special homebrew zombie wizards, being healed by the damage of their attacks as we cut them down.

Like I said, one of the benefits of undeath is that negative energy actually heals you. So the strikes of the magic staves and punches that hit us did some basic damage. Which was then immediately healed by the negative energy their weapon strikes and spells were doing.

However, you'll recall that Damien Bloodmoon was an elf. And not dead. Being a Cleric of a death god doesn't mean that you have the abilities of an undead. That meant that even with the DM being merciful, by the end of the first fight he was covered in blood, mud and withered away to just above half his original strength and constitution. More were patrolling, so we had to run. But that posed a problem.

Remember Krug had heavy armour? And recall his awful stats? He in fact, hadn't got enough strength to wear the armour he'd been given for backstory. He didn't, according to the DM, have enough to remove his own armour. And we attempted to, but also failed our checks according to the DM. And Damien Bloodmoon refused to help, simply blaming Krug and his player. Krug's player thought it was hilarious, and Krug only had enough Intelligence and Wisdom to say his own name, so saw no problem. And Krug, Nox Feratu and Shaman realised that there really...wasn't a problem.

For us, at least.

We slogged through three combats dragging Krug and wading through the mud with him. His speed was so slow that for every step he took, we took about ten. The DM was confused and infuriated that his encounters weren't working, but refused to change them. So we had fun role-playing. Or at least three of us did.

Damien Bloodmoon refused to roleplay, and none of his ranged spells could affect the zombie mages. When he went into melee, he came out wounded as all hell. He went down twice, and it was only the healing supplies of the shaman that saved him.

All the while, he was... Let's say not best pleased. Damien Bloodmoon was getting increasingly wounded, exasperated and longing for the sweet embrace of death as reprieve from the humiliation. His player was getting increasingly redder and rage-filled as time passed. Each fight ended with our characters stronger than ever and his a bloody pulp on the floor, with poor in-character knowledge (and terrible rolls) preventing him from realising why.

Eventually, we reached the final boss, pausing only to paint Krug's armour in contact poison just in case, and to find a stick to help the now-partially-crippled Damien Bloodmoon, cleric of death and murder, walk after being beaten up by angry zombie wizards for hours. And it had, indeed, been hours. Among us, only Damien had a bonus to strength, and we had two swords, a mace and a staff between the four of us. Meaning it was re-death by a thousand cuts for the enemy and a slog and a half for us.

We reach the necromancer and, having taken so long due to dragging the oblivious Krug with us, his big ritual is complete- he raises a fist-sized black onyx egg aloft, crackles with arcane power and causes the bones around him to coalesce into one massive creature - an undead, giant-sized rust monster, radiating an Aura of pure negative energy. Krug opened his arms wide, eager for the metal-eating monster cockroach to free him from his poison-painted metal prison. It ignores him as he's still very far away. Me and the others have our weapons and armour devoured.

Our DM was very much a stickler for note-taking. So because Damien Bloodmoon hadn't written 'clothes' on his sheet, his armour being eaten by the monster left him naked and afraid.

It became clear that the DM had done another f***y-wucky. See, the Aura of negative energy healed me and the Sorcerer by more than its other attacks did. So whilst Damien Bloodmoon was naked, soaked in mud and bleeding to death almost crushed to a pulp in the fetal position, rocking backwards and forwards as his player seethed with hatred, the Shaman and the Campire set about beating the thing to death with our bear hands and a stick.

The session ended once we killed the necromancer, or rather when Krug walked up to him, closed his arms and just crushed the noodle-armed bad guy to death with the weight of his ridiculous armour and poisoned him with its paintwork.

We never revisited the game afterwards. We were told later on that the DM wanted us to use the non-undead races. But at no point had he said as much, even when we asked him about our characters and the restrictions on them. We also learned a valuable lesson. DM for the players who are there, not the ones who you have an idealised mental image of. Tailor your game, otherwise you'll get a sitcom featuring a camp nosferatu, a shaman with no healing, a paladin who could barely move and a Cleric of murder who was ironically the only one at risk of actually dying.

[raeynbowboi]

How to Play as Cyborg in DnD 5e

Next up in our Teen Titans marathon of builds, we’ll build Victor Stone, better known as Cyborg. I sure thought this was going to be a much simpler build, yet I’ve spent two days working and reworking it, and it ended up being nothing like I initially assumed. But in the end, I’m positive this was for the better, as it turned out much better than I expected.

Our first instinct is probably to make Cyborg a Warforged, but here’s the problem with that: Cyborg was born human. He needs to eat, sleep, breathe, these are all things Warforged don’t do. And Cyborg has multiple episodes fixated on maintaining his humanity. To not make him a human is to completely miss the point of his character. Obviously, he is no longer a Standard Human. He has changed. We’ll call him a Variant Human, and we’ll give him Heavy Armor Mastery to reduce non-magical melee damage by 3. We’ll give him +1 INT/+1 CON and he’ll get +1 STR from his free feat.

Mythic Odysseys of Theros gave us the Athlete background. You get proficiency with Athletics and Acrobatics. Next, we’ll pick two Fighter skills, we’ll go for Intimidation and Perception. You’re a big tough guy, and there’s probably a radar or GPS somewhere in all that machinery.

We’re largely a team player, but on more than one occasion we’ve left the team to try and become a solo hero or lead another team. I’d say we’re Chaotic Good.

FIGHTER Brute

We’ll kick off our Cyborg Build as a Fighter. Don’t worry, we’ll be multi-classing, but starting as a Fighter starts us off with Heavy Armor proficiency, which is nice. Plus, we were a human athlete long before we ever became part robot. The Brute Fighter adds 1d4 to every damage roll, meaning you really pack a whollap. It’s almost as if you’ve got brass knuckles or something. Speaking of knuckles, Cyborg likes to punch things, so we’ll pick Unarmed Combat from the Fighting Style options. We deal 1d8 + STR bludgeoning damage when punching with two hands, or 1d6 + STR when our other hand is busy holding something. At 7th level, we get to add 1d6 to saving throws, and if that puts the roll above 20, it’s treated as rolling a nat 20. At 10th level, the extra 1d4 damage increases to 1d6. At 15th level, when you land a crit, you add your Brute Fighter Level to the damage roll, meaning you’re putting out 2d8+5+1d6+15 (23-42) with two hands, or 3d6+20 (23-38) when you’re one-handed. That’s a whole lot of ouch. The next level up is even better, since at level 16, your extra 1d6 damage becomes 1d8. Meaning that by level 16, you’re dealing 3d8+21 (24-45) damage on a two-handed crit, or 2d6+1d8+21 (24-41) on a one-handed crit. And with three actions per turn, the odds of landing all that ouch are pretty high. If you’re allergic to UA subclasses, Champion also works, just not as well.

ARTIFICER Artillerist

Once you’ve started as a Fighter, we can hop on over to Artificer and choose the Artillerist. This gives us an Eldritch Cannon, which we’ll make Tiny so we can hold it in our right hand. We’ll be primarily using the Force Ballista, which has a range of 120 feet, deals 2d8 force damage, and pushes objects 5 feet away from the cannon. If you really want to focus on the cannon, it’ll increase to 3d8 at 9th level, but Cyborg is supposed to be the Tank/DPS of the party. Firing from long range is Starfire’s specialty. Instead, it’s better to have more levels of Fighter and hit more often, and just have the Artificer as much as necessary for ranged combat. But don’t fret, because that Cannon is going to get a lot of usage, because it can be fired on every bonus action, which as a Fighter means you’re going to be dishing out a ton of pain. You can be one-arm boxing an enemy within melee range, while sniping another enemy clear on the other side of the battlefield, and with 3 attacks per turn in the late game, Cyborg has the option to be dishing out 4 attacks total per turn. There’s a reason he’s the muscle of the team.

CYBORG’S SPELLS

Cantrips Mending Message (Titan Communicators)

1st Level Grease Longstrider Jump Shield Thunderwave

To be fair, if we’re going to use our spell slots for anything, its building another Eldritch Cannon if the first one is destroyed. Plus, everything Cyborg could do at first level, Raven can do better, and she has a lot more spell slots to put to it.

ARTIFICER INFUSIONS

Due to our low level, we only get 4 infusions. Now some specify having weapons, but we chose Unarmed Combat. Me personally, I take that as meaning our hands are our weapons, but check with your DM how they consider it, because there’s also a lot of fighter features that only trigger with a weapon attack, so don’t use this build if your DM is stingy about Unarmed Combat not counting as a Weapon attack, because otherwise a lot of your features aren’t going to trigger.

ARMOR OF TOOLS Integrate Tinkerer’s Tools into your armor, add your INT mod to tool checks made with those Tinkerer’s tools.

ENHANCED DEFENSE Increase your AC by +1.

MIND SHARPENER If you fail a spell concentration saving throw, use a reaction to pass instead.

REPLICATE MAGIC ITEM: GOGGLES OF NIGHT Cyborg can create Goggles of Night, letting him see in the dark.

If your DM lets you treat your Hands as weapons drop Mind Shapener and pick up Enhanced Weapon.

ENHANCED WEAPON Add +1 to weapon attack rolls and damage rolls.

ARMORY

Cyborg needs Heavy Armor to act as his robotic body. Molten Bronze Skin (Plate) from Mythic Odysseys of Theros is a new rare heavy armor that is skin-fitting and can be worn under clothes and doesn’t impose stealth disadvantage, which is important, because Cyborg has never made so much noise that he gave away his party. Because it’s molded to his body, it can’t be removed unless he chooses to doff it. Thus,  we have a human who is basically made of metal. How bout that?

As the Tank of the party, only three stats really matter to Cyborg’s Build: Strength will determine how much damage he deals with his punches, Constitution will ensure that he has a big pool of health so he doesn’t die all the time like a wimp, and Intelligence because his Eldritch Cannon’s accuracy is aimed like casting a spell. Because he’s heavily armored, his Dexterity won’t affect his AC, and to be fair, Cyborg isn’t very nimble. He seems quite bulky and heavy-footed. All those Fighter ASI give us the kind of stats I’d hoped to give Starfire.

STR 20 DEX 10 CON 20 INT 18 WIS 10 CHA 8

I spent one of his too many ASI to give him Tough to further maximize his HP. You could max out his INT, but as Raven is the party Intelligence caster, it’s valid to want her INT to be higher than Cyborg’s. With a final HP score of 260 and an AC of 19, Cyborg is starting to look a bit like a one-man army. Not only that, but he reduces non-magical melee damage by 3, and adds 1d6 to saving throws, meaning ranged spell attacks are the only great way to hurt him without him possibly reducing the damage.

HAVE A HEART, TIN-MAN Brute Fighter (16) Artillerist Artificer (4)

STR 20 DEX 10 CON 20 INT 18 WIS 10 CHA 8

ARTIFICER INFUSIONS Armor of Tools Enhanced Armor Enhanced Weapon/Mind Sharpener Replicate Magic Item: Goggles of Night

Between the super charged melee damage, and the fact that Cyborg can also fire his Eldritch Cannon as much as he wants makes this a great combination. He doesn’t need spell slots just to shoot it like some other casters, making it a truly great dual-wielding option. He’s got the HP to shrug off damage, and the power to decimate his opponents. He becomes weaker when he pulls out his cannon in terms of melee combat, but it’s twice as powerful as his two-handed boxing, so it’s a good trade-off.

Variant Rule: Mythic Odysseys of Theros

Unscarred. As a reaction, reduce damage taken by 1d12 + CON mod once per long rest.

Piety: Purphoros, God of the Forge

+3 Cast Shield of Faith equal to your INT mod per long rest. +10 Cast Heat Metal once per long rest. You have advantage against being knocked prone. +25 Use your reaction to avoid being pushed. +50 Increase your Strength or Intelligence by 2 to a maximum of 22.

We set out to make Cyborg a high damage DPS striker who could tank a hit like it was nothing, and I think we’ve accomplished that with this build. Some might argue for a 12/8 split, and it’s certainly passable, but Cyborg really doesn’t need it. He’s not a caster. Cyborg is the muscle, and that’s what he’s doing. He’s only an Artificer for the arm cannon, otherwise, he’s primarily a melee fighter, and I don’t want to waste his levels on something that’s not his primary focus.

[autumnblogs]

Day 10: I think the true purpose of this game is to see how many qualifiers we can get to precede the word "self" and still understand what we're talking about

https://homestuck.com/story/1642

I don’t think anyone has said much about Calsprite. There’s not much to be said. I’m pretty sure, based on the Juju rules, that this Lil Cal probably doesn’t count as the real one - supposedly, any version of a Juju from a Doomed Timeline doesn’t count as the real thing? In any case, it’s a very mild comfort that this being isn’t a source of even more power for the already arbitrarily powerful Lord English.

Another thing that I think is interesting to note is that Dave’s use of iPhone technology marks him, in my opinion, as a poseur. While I am by no means advocating against buying from Microsoft’s competitors, but Mac vs. PC is one of those parts of my childhood, and as an actual IT Professional I’ve learned more than a little about the way that they brand themselves and the history of Apple’s struggle for market share - Apple doesn’t advertise its products as computing alternatives, or as productivity software, or whatever - Apple sells a lifestyle. Apple products are styled as the sexier, more cerebral, more artistic, more individualistic alternative to Microsoft’s products, a computer not for the Office Drone but for... well, the Hipster. Hipsters have stopped really being a thing, or at least, nobody calls themselves that any more.

Like the vast majority of subcultures, I suspect the hipster subculture has kind of been swallowed by time, its symbols expropriated by Capitalism, its center hollowed out and its aesthetics packaged for mass production, as the cynical and jaded approach to popular culture of the hipster, along with its more enthusiastic counterpart “the geek” (actually pretty well personified by John!) became more mainstream - both stereotypes are probably a part of Homestuck’s general commentary on fandom. Fandom is something I think Homestuck talks about, but I don’t think it’s something Homestuck is about in quite the same way that it’s about, say, Narratives, or Reproduction.

More after the break.

https://homestuck.com/story/1643

While Homestuck has been a story that involves some time loops, Act 4 is where it really gets off the ground as an actual Time Travel story. The thing about Time Travel stories, like the thing about Cosmic Horror Stories, is that once a story starts having Time Travel, or Cosmic Horrors in it, it’s that genre forever. This is why DND, for example, is part of a cosmic horror story, because something like 20 years ago, an adventure writer decided that there should be the Far Realm, and now it casts its sticky pall over the rest of the game’s setting.

Homestuck sidesteps this issue largely by involving all of the genres that do this to a story, and just kind of blending them all together into a genre-busting stew. Homestuck is a superhero story. Homestuck is a creation story. Homestuck is a theogony. Homestuck is a cosmic horror story. Homestuck is a time travel story. And so on and so on.

https://homestuck.com/story/1657

And so began one of the greatest partnerships in the history of Paradox Space.

Also of note is that Terezi compares Dave to fire here, not the first or the last bit of symbolism linking him to that element. It’s pretty strongly linked, in general, with The Hero, in kind of the same way that the color Red, and the Sword is in these sorts of things.

Dave fits the Classic Hero Archetype a lot better in a lot of ways than John does, and Bro has been training him for that role since birth. On a much larger scale, Lord English has decreed from his position as the overlord of Paradox Space that Dave is the Hero who should defeat him.

https://homestuck.com/story/1663

Friendship proves once again to be one of the most powerful forces in the universe, changing John’s direction, and steering him away from disaster.

https://homestuck.com/story/1667

Not much to say about this conversation, but the transition between Karkat’s explanation of the Veil and the beginning of [S]Jack: Ascend is smooth as fuck.

https://homestuck.com/story/1670

Our very first self-indulgent author self-insert; the Fourth Wall is explicitly identified as a Fenestrated Plane. 1 Point for the Narrative Contrivance hypothesis.

https://homestuck.com/story/1692

Dave actually does care immensely. Not only does he spend a ton of his time being overshadowed by cooler more powerful men like Bro, and John, now Dave even has to spend his time being overshadowed by cooler versions of himself - and that goes in both directions - both Davesprite and Dave seem to think that the other is the more real, more cool Dave!

https://homestuck.com/story/1710

As a Light Player, Rose is preoccupied with Meaning. She sees it everywhere, and she certainly sees where it is not (at least when she is not Miserable with a capital M). Meaning and Value - Fortune - is not intrinsic to this item, but it is instead bestowed upon it by the fact that Rose loves it, and by the work that Rose put into it. The Rabbit is a labor of love and a treasured belonging, and the Love in the Rabbit is the Light that the Seer Sees.

https://homestuck.com/story/1714

I’m pretty sure that John and Kanaya only talk to each other about twice in all of Homestuck, which is a bit of a shame! John and Karkat are really a lot more alike each other than either of them is comfortable admitting (which I think is probably why Dave is attracted to Karkat). By the transitive law of friendship, it seems to me that John and Kanaya would probably be pretty good friends. On the subject of the other diagonal line in the quadrangle of friendship, I wonder if Rose and Karkat talk to each other pretty much ever?

https://homestuck.com/story/1715

The clear indication here is a parallel between Dave and Sollux, but like a lot of things that probably didn’t go as intended with the Trolls, nothing much ends up materializing from it. I suppose that by fucking off to do nothing for the rest of the adventure, Sollux gets to live Dave’s dream for him, so there’s that.

https://homestuck.com/story/1720

Adorable. This is one of the happiest little moments in the comic.

So often, characters are cut off from one another by moments. They just miss each other, or literally can’t understand each other because of supernatural shenanigans, or can’t communicate with each other on screen because of the way that communication can’t happen unmediated in Homestuck.

And even when they can talk to each other, often the awkwardness and pain of communicating with other people, of trying to get them to understand you the way you actually are, instead of only seeing you one certain way, is too great, and communication proves impossible.

But here, Rose and Dave don’t need words to hang out.

They shut up and jam.

(It’s also incredibly sweet that Rose‘s actual in-person esteem of Dave is so great that she cannot restrain her own thought process. For all her joshing, she really does think Dave is cool.)

https://homestuck.com/story/1722

Also incredibly sweet that Rose’s first order of business as soon as they’re done playing around is to destroy that goddamn puppet.

https://homestuck.com/story/1754

Just missed him.

https://homestuck.com/story/1775

I wish not to contemplate the implication that Homestuck Sprite Mode Legs are actually wafer thin.

https://homestuck.com/story/1812

Nearly as soon as Rose has awoken and absorbed herself from the Doomed Timeline, she gets down to business alchemizing a lot of dangerous and powerful artifacts in preparation to fuck shit up. I’ve never thought about it much before, but I think it’s not hard to say that the memories she absorbed from the other timeline cause Rose to embrace her more reckless and less charitable side. She comments on her own dangerous pursuit of power, and then immediately ignores that train of thought.

https://homestuck.com/story/1836

Dave sure is fixated on bottoms.

https://homestuck.com/story/1852

Note to self. Come back to this.

So far, the only thing of note is the number 12, a portent related to the victors of Homestuck, if only coincidentally.

https://homestuck.com/story/1857

Dave’s sincerity senses are tingling. Maybe it’s an instinct since he and Roxy are pretty similar people, maybe it’s just because Dave himself is not nearly as insincere as he wants to be.

Dave’s anxiety about being watched is also probably best exemplified by his insistence on hiding his eyes behind glasses.

https://homestuck.com/story/1887

Adorable!

I wonder if Andrew already had the sprite designs for these squirts, and their names picked out at this time.

The hair and accessories are certainly correct.

https://homestuck.com/story/1895

Before I get too much further into this sequence, I’d like to pause and take a second to just appreciate this prose. The style is captivating.

The shipping pun is also pretty good.

https://homestuck.com/story/1903

BladeKindEyeWear has already done a pretty good job explaining what the Ultimate Riddle is, so I won’t belabor it too much more than he has here. The Ultimate Riddle itself is, “What Will You Do?” And the answer to it is, “Do What You Will.”

Do What You Will isn’t just the inscription on AURYN, it’s also an extremely old phrase intended for spiritual enlightenment, historically first formulated by Saint Augustine in his Sermon On Love, where he puts it thusly, “Love, and Do What You Will.” The Love that Augustine is talking about is not Romantic Love or even familial love, but Universal Unconditional Love - goodwill toward everyone and everything, to have one’s Heart’s Desire be that everyone should flourish and be happy.

Another formulation, the Wiccan Rede is, “An It Harm None, Do What Ye Will,” perhaps a more detached, declaration. In either case, the Will here is not talking about merely chasing simple wants, but an invitation to follow one’s true will, not to respond to simple passions, but to take voluntary action in accordance with who one is as a person.

https://homestuck.com/story/1905

threatening.............

https://homestuck.com/story/1922

Jake Harley begins a life of serial abandonment.

https://homestuck.com/story/1930

I really should have brought this up first when Rose and Davesprite went back into time, but this is about the time Homestuck starts to get lousy with all kinds of alternate selves, Dream Selves, Doomed Selves, and so on and so on, and from a narrative frame of reference, they’re actually all literally the same guy - the actions of one version of a character inform us about all versions of that character.

More on that later.

https://homestuck.com/story/1931

More Roleplaying. John has a wild imagine spot.

https://homestuck.com/story/1934

Dave stares at the blood on his hands, and contemplates his death for a long time.

https://homestuck.com/story/1936

Some immediate foreshadowing in here. Jade, I’m pretty sure, is one of the few people in Tavros’ life who shows him some genuine unconditional friendliness, so it’s no wonder that he latches onto her.

The way he does is still pretty creepy though.

https://homestuck.com/story/1940

As long as I’m mostly focusing on the emotional dimension of Homestuck, the two major emotional beats in this Flash are the Sovereign Slayer slaughtering WV’s army, revealing the source of his self-loathing and trauma, and the death of Jade’s Dream Self.

The death of her Dream Self is not nearly the beginning of Jade’s Trauma Conga Line, but it’s definitely the first in the chain of events that leads her to finally snap out of her learned helplessness and blind optimism, and to start taking her fate into her own hands. She’s been so sure of her destiny up to this point, and now things are finally starting to get out of hand.

Also, I choose to believe that the bizarre Squiddles interlude is the first moment that the Dark Gods make contact with Jade’s psyche. They know she’s about to die, and they’re starting to communicate with her.

Anyway, that’s all for today.

Yesterday’s cough turned out to be post-viral infection, since I had Covid the week of the 11th, so for now this is Cam signing off, Medicated, and Not Alone.

[jackdawyt]

I am beyond privileged to share my very Early Access impressions of The Waylanders, thanks to the developers at Gato Studio who gave me an early key. 

The Waylanders is a party-based RPG set in the Celtic and Medieval eras, inspired by classics like Dragon Age: Origins, Neverwinter Nights 2, and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I’ve only played the first 10 hours of this game, and I’ve fallen for it. It’s very apparent that the developers of The Waylanders love Dragon Age. And so, to anyone who loves Dragon Age, will love The Waylanders.

I’ve played prologue and the very few early hours of the game which are in early access, meaning there’s plenty of work that needs to be done and nothing in the game is final. However, I was able to get an amazing feel for what the finished game will look like, and believe me when I say, this is the Dragon Age successor we’re all looking for.  

Character

Upon starting the game, you’re taken to a very recognizable character creator, clearly inspired by Dragon Age: Origins. You can choose between a male/female body, four races, six classes, and then an origin story based on each of those choices.  

The races in Waylanders are rather distinct, as opposed to traditional DND races like elves, humans and dwarves. Here we have the choice between human, werewolf, mourian and semi-fomorian.  

The classes are rather straight forward, each of them have unique weapons, abilities and features. As an example, Rangers have the Pets feature which allows them to have animal companions, and Sorcerers can teleport using their specific magic feature.  

You can customise your character with a few hairstyles, facial types, different skin tones, eye, hair and facial hair colours.  

You can then apply more points into your statistics based on your race and class. And the final aspect of customisation is your identity, where you choose your name, pronouns and voice.  

The voice is just for grunting noises in combat, I believe the game follows a silent protagonist so you can make up your own voice.  

After making those final decisions, you’re given a cute lore character summary, backing up each choose you’ve made for your PC. Now your adventure can begin.  

Story

The story is told through a plentiful of cutscenes and long dialogue interactions, of course, just what Dragon Age fans love. I found each of them engaging and I was hooked from the start really.  

I’ve played the prologue twice, and a few blocked out side quests that are still in very early alpha. The story starts with the Spanish Celtic tribes arriving at Ireland to meet and convey a union with their gods. However, things don’t go according to plan, as you can imagine.  

What’s fascinating about The Waylanders compared to Dragon Age for example, is that the lore is steeped in Irish and Spanish folk lore. We discover many legends like ‘The Tuatha Dé Danann’. Which means ‘the tribe of the gods’ in Old Gaelic. It’s exciting lore that actually exists in some of the real world’s sub-cultures today.

The setting of the game is based in medieval Galicia, which is in Spain. The developers are actually from Spain, the stories they’re telling throughout The Waylanders are tales each of them has grown up with.  

I won’t say much more on the main story, other than the protagonist has a mystery that reminds me of Kingdoms Of Amular Reckoning. Of course, another stellar RPG that takes pinches from Dragon Age: Origins.  

The plot seems to surround a lot of time travel themes, going forward and back in time, with many choices and consequences taking effect from your decisions.

As a whole, the writing is excellent. And that’s expected due to the fact that Chris Avellone, best known for writing Fallout: New Vegas, took the helm. Alongside with him, Ex-Telltale's Emily Grace Book who’s the fabulous Narrative Lead.  

Not to mention Mike Laidlaw aided to team with his creative vison to “create a high-level narrative and to structure the game and the story.”

And if that’s not enough, Dragon Age veteran Inon Zur composed the soundtrack of The Waylanders too, which is just beautiful.  

I want to share more about the main characters. So far, they’re compelling, even in just the first hour, I found myself latching onto each of them, with their many different personalities.

In my opinion, the dialogue holds the game up, I found myself engaging in every single conversation I could, interacting with every character. I’d say my favourite character so far is Nazhedja. Naz for short.

She’s very intriguing! Being a mourian, she’s immortal, though she composes herself as a charming and relatable individual.  

The voice cast is amazing and familiar with the likes of Simon Templeman, known for playing Loghain in Dragon Age taking the role of the Celtic Druid Amergin. Personally, as a Brit, I fell in love with hearing so many of my countries’ varying accents.

And apparently there will absolutely be romance in the game, however, it’s not in the alpha stages. But we can all look forward to that!  

Gameplay

The Waylanders gameplay centres on building up the narrative, there’s an emphasis on interactive conversations. You’ll spend a fair amount of time asking questions and getting to know each of the characters in this world, building bonds and shaping the story.  

The game has a linear feel to it, however, once the prologue is done, you can explore many of the hub areas. Very much like Dragon Age: Origins. The world is lush to explore, and the art style is fantastic. It has a cartoony feel to it.  

While exploring the stunning areas, you can switch the camera’s placement for a more isometric feel, or stick to a more third person feel, whatever suits your playstyle. This is an amazing quality of life feature, that I think other games like this need to adopt.  

There’s a huge codex, which updates frequently after conversations. It’s a wonderful touch, I spent plenty of time reading each of the characters and their backstories.  

Combat

The combat is rough around the edges and it can be hard to properly aim and target your opponents. Too often I’d cast a spell at an offensive enemy, and I’d accidently click and switch to my warrior companion who’s bashing the same enemy in the face.  

You can have up to five party companions at a time. And there are these grouped up attacks you can do as a squad called formations. You band together and attack. It works like a charm.  

The combat does feel very identical to Dragon Age: Origins, even down to the animations of fighting and how long it takes to fire a spell, or shoot an arrow from a bow.  

One of the developers gave me a few console commands for my stream, and I was able to see what animal pets we could have, I was very surprised with the amount of animal companions you can have. There’s even a dragon!  

Each of the classes prove to be very unique, in my two playthroughs, I played as a Sourcer and a Rogue. I loved the individual features each class provides whether it’s a passive or an actual ability, each class have dynamic ways to stand out. And of course, if you’re undecided which class to play, Waylanders is a party-based RPG, you’ll always have a companion with a different class you can switch to and play as.  

Summary

In summary, judging the early hours of The Waylanders, the game has very reminiscent systems and gameplay that anyone who’s played Dragon Age will find themselves familiar with. However, the game has proven itself to be original with its engaging story, intriguing characters and unique lore.  

Of course, the game is in its early access alpha stages, and there are plenty of bugs and things that need further improvement. But I can see the heart and passion that has gone behind this game, and that’s what I’ve grown to like about this game.  

I’d say to anyone who’s a huge fan of Dragon Age: Origins, why not go and give The Waylanders a shot. The game launches on Steam’s Early Access store on June 16th, support this game as it grows throughout development, and releases as an epic Dragon Age successor.  

[fistsoflightning]

COMBAT MODE // ZAYA QESTIR

★★★★★★★★☆☆  —  STRENGTH ★★★★★★★☆☆☆  —  OFFENSE ★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  DEFENSE ★★★★★★★★★☆  —  SPEED ★★★★★☆☆☆☆☆  —  DURABILITY ★★★★★★★★☆☆  —  ACCURACY ★★★★★★★★★☆  —  AGILITY ★★★★★★★★★☆  —  STAMINA ★★★★★★☆☆☆☆  —  TEAMWORK ★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  STEALTH ★★★★★★★★★☆  —  MELEE ★★★★★★★☆☆☆  —  BLADES ★★★★★★★★☆☆  —  BLUNT ★★★★★★★★☆☆  —  RANGED ☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  MAGIC ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  TRAPS ★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆  —  MEDIC

OVERVIEW:

Zaya grew up on the Steppe where fighting was almost guaranteed to be a daily occurrence with how they commonly went out “adventuring”, hunting, or parleying with their older brother for “khan experience” (especially when the Naadam was on the horizon), and as such has the combat experience to match. They’re extremely quick on their feet, hit hard and fast, and rarely let their guard down. Most of their combat set relies on being within melee range, but give them merely a few seconds and they’ll pull out either their chakrams or their bow to hunt you down.

With fighting experience linking back to a good dozen Naadams or so plus hunting experience, it doesn’t quite matter whether their enemy is monster or human; a life is a life, and a fight is a fight. Zaya does not hold back in a real fight, especially if the lives of others are at risk. It’s seldom known, but Zaya can and will call their yol down to spawn a thunderstorm if they need the extra advantage to win. They can also shock people themselves with their tattoo inscription, but they rarely do.

If Zaya finds themselves cornered or losing a fight (ex. Zenos during Rhalgr’s Reach), it’s very likely that they’ll overload their tattoo inscription to call down a very large bolt of lightning to turn the tides at the cost of their wellbeing; it’s killed them twice before, actually. There’s a reason they tend not to rely on it.

INJURIES:

If one didn’t know them personally, it would be an easy assumption to make that none of their injuries have left their mark on them; after all, Au’ra scale patterns differ from person to person... right? 

Those who do know them well enough know that their body is littered with scars; they’re merely hidden due to the fact that their scars fill in with scales. Among the numerous scars on their body, the most major ones lie on their calves, upper back, and left arm and hand; from shards of Ifrit’s nails, Lahabrea and Nidhogg’s claws, and Zenos several times respectively. These scales are much softer than the rest of Zaya’s scales, and need extra protection, which is why all of Zaya’s melee armor includes a pauldron and full armor cover on their left side, plus metal boots.

Their horns also bear numerous scars from unfortunate snaps, but those seem to have healed much better than the rest. Their quick speed has saved them from more... fatal injuries, like being blasted by Nidhogg’s Ala Morn or Hades’ claws swiping through their neck; a trait that also fools others into thinking they might very well be untouchable.

FIGHTING STYLE.

[ bold for often // italicize for situational // strikethrough for never ]

commander /  duelist / “honorable” / dishonorable / would have others do their fighting /  stealthy  / long-ranged / melee / technological / sorcery / superhuman abilities /  has fought in an illegal tourney / a lover of fighting / a hater of fighting  / cowardly / reckless / strategic / uses underhanded tricks  / renowned for their skill / trained /  untrained / keeps skills secret / won a battle / lost a battle / ruthless / merciful

FLAWS.

moody | short-tempered | emotionally unstable | whiny | controlling | conceited | possessive | paranoid | liar | impatient | cowardly | bitter | selfish | power-hungry | greedy | lazy | judgmental | forgetful | impulsive | spiteful | stubborn | sadistic | petty | unlucky

STRENGTHS.

honest | trustworthy | thoughtful | caring | brave | patient | selfless | ambitious | tolerant | lucky | intelligent | confident | focused | humble | generous | merciful | observant | wise | clever | charming | cheerful | optimistic | decisive | adaptive | calm | loyal

tagged by: @whitherliliesbloom. but i took some inspiration from @lordofcrowns! 

tagging: @sati-ffxiv @to-the-voiceless @windupnamazu @winduphaurchefant @verbroil @ofthesilverlining @stars-bleed-hearts-shine @nuclearanomaly and you! feel free to tag me even if i didnt mention you; these are super fun to read!

bonus notes below the cut!

EXTENDED OVERVIEW.

Zaya is reliant on being all up in someone’s face in most fights, since their strength is most of what they have. All of their jobs do physical damage, if you haven’t noticed; they’re basically the equivalent of a DnD character with all their stats in strength and dexterity with nothing in constitution or intelligence.

Speaking of which; Zaya is magically inept. An incident in the Calamity where they faced off against a shard of the fallen Dalamud led to them 1) dying and 2) losing all magical capabilities they had beforehand. To make up for that (seeing as they can cast some magic today, like song and dark magicks), they have a series of magical inscriptions/tattoos on their body. It’s a little frightening to look at with all their scales, so most of them are hidden away with glamour prisms. The only one that isn’t hidden by prisms (instead hidden by an armband on their right arm) is their lightning inscription from a long time ago; it confers them a lot of lightning related benefits, such as full lightning resistance and the ability to discharge collected energy (Greased Lightning >:3). It also gives them a bond with their thunderbird yol, Ochir!

Once in a fight, Zaya will do everything they can to avoid extra damage; unlike most of their fellow Warriors of Light when under the effect of their Blessing of Light, they don’t heal over time. A setback from their aforementioned magical incapability, but it really does blow when they’re the only one around to fight [insert monster name here] since they have to rely on potions specially brewed for them by Tehra’ir. They’re heavily reliant on not taking damage at all instead of just eating it, which changes up parts of their dark knight skillset. The only exception to this is acting as a meatshield; if someone younger or more injured than them is about to take a blow (for example, Elwin or A’dewah), they will more than likely leap into the path of danger, whether they have The Blackest Night, Riddle of Earth, or nothing at all.

In most fights, Zaya will simply stick to one of their various skills to finish the job; most of the time, they’re not running the risk of death should they need to run. However, for fights such as Zenos, Shinryu, Innocence, or Hades, they pull out most (if not all) the stops. Rarely will they be seen using their dark knight soulstone, since the whole concept relies on one having mana to spare; instead of mana, their dark knight skills take from their health in exchange for longer protection/more damage. (Blood Gauge indeed.) They won’t hesitate to play dirty to win if it comes down to it, and are more than willing to die for a better chance of winning the fight for others.

Much of their fighting style is built on quickly defeating the enemy; long, drawn out fights are not their forte. In a one-on-one fight, Zaya will constantly try to trip up their opponent through quick movements and dodges for more free hits, but won’t go so far as to taunt. Hardened, scaley knuckles and kicks from metal boots are enough to knock most soldiers over easily, and their strength from years and years of training only adds to that.

Zaya actually does know how to fight on yolback; it’s dozens of times more complicated without proper magic, but it’s doable. As long as Ochir is in the area (a giant fricking bird that’s like. the size of a fairly small house.) Zaya has a variety of options that are all immensely reckless in nature.

[sapphireemeralds]

For my DnD character ask meme...odds for Eliot and evens for Mo—And you can pick a letter 💜💚

Alrighty, let’s do this! :D

1) What would they consider to be their biggest failure?

Eliot: She feels responsible for her younger siblings, and sees their refusal to leave the family business and come clean as her failing.  Bill’s descent into even more despicable shit really gnaws on her - she loved him dearly and defended him from Margaret’s abuse and her full siblings’ insults as best she could, and she tried so hard teach him to be compassionate and look for the goodness and inherent worth in people, not just the money and favors he could cajole or squeeze out of them; when she joined the Valoran police force, though, that drove a wedge between them and drove Bill closer to Angus.

2) What’s the story behind their name?

Mo: Named after his great-great-grandfather, who was a valiant soldier and famous fencer.  Gramps would not approve of our Mo’s uh, significantly less artful swordsmanship or fondness for bludgeoning weapons.

3) What’s their relationship with their family?

Eliot: Loves Fiona and trusts her whole-heartedly, though they’ve drifted apart a little as they’ve grown up and gone about their lives.  Forgives Margaret (Mom) for most of the pain caused, but doesn’t trust a single word Margaret says and struggles to control her temper around her.  For younger siblings, see (1).  Tuk Tuk is her baby, her buddy, her lil’ sunshine.

4) What’s one song that describes them or is them?

Mo: Whoo BOY I actually don’t have a character playlist for Mo, but for now let’s go with “Spoilin’ for a Fight” by AC/DC

5) Who is their best friend?

Eliot: Mireth in the Crazy Campaign, and... honestly, I’m not sure who yet in P&C, but she is drawn to very charismatic, composed people, so she’s gravitating toward Caspian and Talise.  Dealing with Quiggley’s awkward earnestness is too much like looking in a mirror; she likes and respects Jax, but doesn’t quite know how to connect with him; and she hasn’t spent enough time with Brax or Briony yet.

6) Why are they their class?

Mo: When he joined the army, he basically had three choices - stab/slash/smack shit (fighter), pray a lot and heal shit (cleric), or study a lot of arcane shit so he can stand at the back casting fireballs (wizard).  A straightforward man, he chose the most straightforward option.

7) What do they think of their party members?

Eliot: In essence, “I would sooner throw myself in front of a charging behemoth than stand by and let you weirdos deal with this nonsense alone.”  They’re the closest thing she’s had to home, and she just wants them all to be safe and happy.

8) In what ways are they similar to you?

Mo: He’s very forthright about his opinions, and those opinions don’t change easily; we both hate being wrong.  That said, we’re both usually fine going along with a group consensus.  Usually.

9) In what ways are they different from you?

Eliot: She has a more optimistic world-view and greater faith in the divine, and she’s far braver than I’ll ever be.

10) What do they look for in a romantic partner, if they have a romantic orientation?

Mo: Easy-going, sensible, sociable, adventurous but not too wild, loyal but not clingy

11) If they had a patronus or animagus form, what would it be?

Eliot: I was trying to think of something cooler that would still fit, but nah, let’s be real... she’d have/be a Golden Retriever.

12) What do they smell like?

Mo: Leather, sandalwood, and cedar

13) What is their secret skill?

Eliot: Once she’s heard a song all the way through a couple times, she can henceforth recognize it almost instantly.

14) What is their relationship to spirituality?

Mo: Decidedly meh.  Mo’s no atheist - he’s met enough devastatingly effective clerics on the battlefield to think otherwise - but he’s not deeply interested in the gods, nor does he think they’re as interested in mortal affairs as people claim they are.  He’s the Forgotten Realms equivalent of someone who only goes to church on Christmas and Easter and prays, like, twice a year at most.

15) If they were to be remembered for something, what would they want to be remembered for?

Eliot: For everyday acts of mercy and kindness, and for standing up for those who couldn’t stand up for themselves. 

16) Why did they become an adventurer?

Mo: He found that once he picked up a sword, it was hard to put it down; for years, settling back into civilian life simply seemed unthinkable.  Age and a narrowly-missed apocalypse finally changed that.

17) What’s one thing about their backstory that came to you after you already started playing the campaign?

Eliot: THE WHOLE THING.

18) Do you have any headcanons for them that haven’t come up in game? Or headcanons for other party members?

Mo: As Elemental Evil is basically an extended dungeon crawl with a clear goal and limited opportunities for characters to just... talk... AND I joined that campaign late, basically none of my headcanons for Mo came up in-game.  In fact, my headcanon for him is still a little sparse.  Two tidbits, though: he has a stamp collection, and he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket to save his damn life.

19) Any ships with your character? If a PC or NPC, what interaction launched it?

Eliot: For the Crazy Campaign, Eliot/Keegan, obvi - god bless poor unsuspecting Drew for tapping into my latent obsession with consensual possession as a character dynamic/basis for a ship.  As for P&C, Eliot is crushing HARD on Giulietta, although potential spoiler alert, it’s unlikely anything will come of it.

20) What would your character consider their biggest success? Or what is your favorite success your character has had so far?

Mo: Helping stop the apocalypse ain’t half bad, he’s pretty pleased with that. ^w^

As for the letter, let’s go with B: Hogwarts Houses! :D ( * indicates some serious uncertainty; also, I’m excluding characters I haven’t played yet, or only played for one or two sessions)

Gryffindors: Flora, Bells, Mo, Diantha, Skylar*, Fae, Ace

Slytherins: Bao, Takara

Ravenclaws: Jamie, Kiya

Hufflepuffs: Eliot, Theron, Jheri, Flint, Idris*

[words-writ-in-starlight]

Hey Star! Bit of a weird question, do you know where's a good place to find a simplified ruleset for dnd 5e, specifically for a wizard. My wizard is finding it quite hard to remember all the rules and before I condense them all myself I thought I'd ask around and see if anyone has any resources that would do the trick. (Also, a quick update on the campaign, I made our kobold rogue worried about some mountains and now I know why you love to make your players worry. I feel very accomplished.)

Off the top of my head, I don’t know of any good resources for simplified 5e rules--I started out playing 3.5, so 5e is already about 14x simpler than what I originally learned.

I really want to convey that, as a 3.5 Druid on a campus with dubious-at-best wifi, I had one binder full of spells and another binder full of wild shapes, and spent 85% of my combat time trying to grasp the 3.5 grapple rules.  As a rules-laywer little-shit player, I miss having four thousand skills that I could finesse to give me stupid-high advantages on things like “Search” (plus thirty, I had a plus thirty to Search in my last 3.5 campaign), but 5e is WAY more accessible.

HOWEVER.  Even 5e is still pretty rules-dense, so let me try and hit some suggestions.  Without knowing the specifics of what your players are struggling with, these are going to be pretty broad, but you’re totally welcome to send in a more specific request if you want.

No one knows all the rules to DnD.  If a player, especially a new player, needs to check with their DM for every skill check and every attack roll, that’s okay!  Every DM I know keeps the Player’s Handbook in arm’s reach to panic-check a rule or a spell, or else they fully Griffin McElroy it and put the “rules” through a blender.  Please reassure your wizard from me that it’s totally okay if they’re having trouble keeping things straight.  As long as they’re having a good time, they don’t need to be able to recite the damage for Fireball off the cuff.  That’s what references are for.

The internet is your friend.  Again, multiple binders full of spells and animal shapes to be a 3.5 Druid.  This was because the internet on Friday nights got bad fast because Dolly (boys dorm) liked to run LAN parties, so googling my spells wasn’t practical because it took so long.  HOWEVER, the internet doth give many gifts, and if you and your party have regular access to it, I wholeheartedly recommend abusing that to your heart’s content.  Don’t even bother trying to keep that shit in order in your head or on your character sheet.  I shelled out for a DnDBeyond account, which does work great for my party, but you don’t need one--googling spells, special attacks, whatever, will work like a dream.  To facilitate your party being able to do this during fast-paced combat, as the DM, I suggest keeping people apprised of who’s coming up next in combat!  I do this by saying “Okay, Azara, you’re up, Heinous, you’re on deck,” as a way to remind people that they’re coming up and that they should be planning their next move, including looking up anything they might need.

It’s always a d20.  Okay, you don’t literally exclusively need a d20, but I resolved a lot of my mom’s anxiety about using the wrong dice by saying very plainly “if you want to hit someone, do something, or interact with the world in any way, you are going to use a d20.”  Everything else is near-exclusively used for damage rolls.  Damage rolls using Other Dice are described explicitly in spells or weapon attacks--for example, Fireball does 8d6 damage (described when you google the spell) and a greataxe does 1d12 damage (you should have weapon damage noted down beside the weapon).  Basically, it’s a d20 until your DM says otherwise.

Proficiency bonus is your friend.  You get a proficiency bonus in 5e rather than level-by-level skill point allotment like in 3.5.  This helps balance the playing field and limit minmaxing to a more manageable level, and also reduces the amount of math you need to do in order to level up.  Here is how any roll in 5e works: the number on the d20 + the relevant stat + (if relevant) proficiency bonus.  Let’s say you’re a Level 3 barbarian, and you want to hit someone with an axe.  You roll a d20 and get a 13, then you add your strength for a melee attack--let’s say it’s +4--bringing you to a subtotal of 17.  But you’re proficient with your axe!  So now you add +2 for your proficiency bonus, bringing you to a 19 all told.  Good job, your target is definitely going to feel it.  If you only know three numbers in 5e, they should be your proficiency bonus, your primary stat (for our example barbarian it’s Strength, for a wizard it’s Intelligence), and your armor class.  If pressed, you could probably get through a whole session with just those three numbers.  As long as you know what you are and aren’t proficient in (mark it down on your sheet if you haven’t already), you’re good.

Spell slots: write them down.  If you’re using DnDBeyond, they have a helpful little line of boxes to tick off each time you use a spell of a certain level, or an expendable ability like Rage or Action Surge.  I would recommend this technique, it’s the one I used when I did paper character sheets.  Make tally marks, tick boxes, cross out numbers, whatever.  If you have your spell slots written down instead of trying to remember what you still have available, you have more brain power to free up for other, more interesting things.

Combat’s a bitch.  Combat rules are the finickiest part of DnD, and again, do not feel bad about not getting them right off.  In fact, don’t feel bad about not getting it for multiple years.  I probably only got a good handle on combat in the last six months and I’ve been DMing for three years.  That being said, you can do three things during your turn, and one thing the rest of the time, and I’m going to break them down as best I can.  During your turn you have:

MOVEMENT: Pretty much what it says on the tin.  You have a movement speed based on what kind of critter you are (and occasionally what class you are, e.g. monks), and you can move that far. 

ACTION: This is where you Do Stuff, including but not limited to attacking.  You will start at a low level with one attack per action--that may be an axe, a spell, a punch, whatever, but you get to deal damage or protect your friends or whatever.  As you level up, some classes can do more stuff with a single action, notably fighters, who can basically evolve into a murder whirlwind with four attacks per action.  On your action, you can also interact with something (like, say, a bomb you’re trying to defuse or a lock you’re trying to pick), keep moving (this is called “Dash” and lets you move in the same way as the above MOVEMENT), get paranoid (this is called “Dodge” and gives you advantage on getting out of range of an attack), use your special abilities (like a ranger’s Primeval Awareness, or a cleric’s Channel Divinity), hide, (this is called “Hide”), or any number of other things.  You may also get something called an Action Surge, depending on your class, which lets you take ACTION twice in a row.  (High level fighters can actually do like...twelve attacks on a turn with this.  Fighters are underappreciated.  Be a fighter, julienne your enemies.)

BONUS ACTION: Something short and sweet that may also save your life.  Barbarians can Rage as a bonus action.  Certain spells can be triggered as a bonus action, like Hunter’s Mark or Hex.  Other spells can be used as a bonus action, like Spiritual Weapon.  Some classes can do other stuff as a bonus action, like a monk using it to attack or a rogue using it to hide.  If you’re not sure if something is a bonus action, it’s probably not.  It’s a fairly limited but powerful list.

If you’re not the person who’s currently taking their turn, you have something called a REACTION, once per turn, where you do something triggered by someone else’s turn.  Most importantly, this allows you to do something called an attack of opportunity when someone leaves your personal space--you get to whack them with whatever melee weapon you’ve got.  For some classes (notably wizards and anyone who can access the wizard spell list) you will eventually be able to use your reaction to exercise the Biggest Dick Energy in all of Dungeons and Dragons, which is called Counterspell.  Actually any spell saying that its casting time is “1 reaction” can be cast like this, but mostly people just use it for Counterspell.  REACTION is also what lets you “hold” your action, which means saying “I can hear Nym running toward me with the goblins behind her--I’m holding Fireball until the second the horde is in range.”  When the ‘trigger’ you chose happens, you can do your thing.  This means you’re committed and cannot adjust your plan if things change (in the example, Nym might still be in range, but your Fireball is still going to go off), but it also gives you the ability to lay a trap.  

Again, combat is a bitch.  The DM’s job is to know this stuff and help the players when they need it.  There’s no shame in needing a cheat sheet with this stuff noted down or needing to google references for casting time or whatever.  As long as you’re keeping things rolling and having fun, combat works however the DM says it does.  If you realize you made a mistake, just move on.  The nerd gods don’t care.

Any rule too obnoxious to live with can be dismissed by the DM.  You think I played around with 3.5 grapple rules when I was DMing?  Absolutely not.  In my campaigns you rolled a strength check and you lived or died by it with good grace.  If there’s something nonessential that your players really struggle with or you personally think is dumb as hell, just.  Don’t use it.  Wizards of the Coast isn’t going to come to your home and shake you down for ignoring travel rules or whatever.  Homebrew, my babies.

[obeetlebeetle]

Do all the dnd asks!

1. A favorite character you have played.

done!

2. Your favorite character that someone else has played.

o my god.. this is so hard, my group makes really good characters! for each of them:zach - nickels!! trauma child kenku weirdo who sold their soul to talk.. who grew up to be an angry pirate who adopted a child on impulse.ari - lael, obviously. they have a half-elf complex, a good chunk of their personality is being the kid that catches lizards, and they have a robot arm.lemon - honestly? jj devinyl. i mean, john mulaney as a tiefling cleric who loves his wife and is also going completely insane? yeah.bree - i.. love layla. she’s a good-aligned cleric to an evil god and her and kellan are the cutest couple in dnd tbh.connor - guardian is a robot.

3. Your favorite side quest.

o fuck!! y’all.. it’s bufo. it’s the fact that my talking toad npc was so lovable that they unlocked the quest in which his mother hunts him down and tries to kill him so that she can live forever. they killed her ofc and bufo was untransformed into a handsome.. halfling.

4. Your current campaign.

i’m running a murder mystery set aboard an airship! with strong cosmic horror elements! and i’m playing in a large-scale epic about spies caught up in the very start of a continent-wide war.

5. Favorite NPC.

also a very hard question. on one hand, jean is my actual boyfriend and also a literal angel assassin. on the other hand, nika is a child god trapped in an amulet whose super god power makes people trip which is so fucking funny. back around to the first hand, which is now the third, aengus is so well-done as a villain that he’s almost scared me in my real-life actual heart and yet he’s an a huge loser with breakup trauma, which is objectively also so fucking funny. on my fourth hand, fela is my most important npc who i’m probably in love with and she’s been in every one of my campaigns. on my FIFTH hand--

6. Favorite death (monster, player character, NPC, etc).

done!

7. Your favorite downtime activity.

done!

8. Your favorite fight/encounter.

that time nasuada beat lumley up in her own dumb-ass head, and lumley’s response was to find this super hot.

9. Your favorite thing about D&D.

getting together and spending time with my friends! or maybe that it lets me be creative without the stress writing gives me.

10. Your favorite enemy and the enemy you hate the most.

fav enemy is def aengus!! like wow he’s fucking terrifying!! and i hate yin&yang the most, they were so creepy and cruel and they were never really punished.

11. How often do you play and how often would you ideally like to play?

i dm once a week these days, and i play sporadically. thesis year has been hard on me! but ideally i would love to dm twice a week and play in one or two steady campaigns, or dm once a week with regular one-shot sessions!

12. Your in game inside jokes/memes/catchphrases and where they came from.

o.. there’s a lot?? my favorite is “honeyclaw pissed on lenthol” bc our barbarian thought it would be a good idea to climb into the robot piloted by the “big bad” (or so we thought at the time), and then to sell her bluff that she was looking for the bathroom, she just...... pissed herself >:(

13. Introduce your current party.

as a dm: lael (half-elf magitechnician who bases their mad science off of cool bugs); guardian (robot paladin on his third life, basically robocop with light existential crises); senhora (brash and kind-hearted by turns, an elf who [REDACTED] before becoming a ranger and bonding w a wolf); jj devinyl (a tiefling cleric who does stand-up comedy and loves his wife); and percy (an android with identity issues, driven by curiosity, and love for magic, and literally no qualms about threatening to kill her friends).

as a player:rowan (the last prince of a lost kingdom and also the saddest, gayest boy in town); ko&kokumo (my elf boy whose soul split in two after leaving his warlock patron, driven by nosiness and romance respectively); honeyclaw (a tabaxi pro-wrestler who deserted her life as a child soldier, pissed on lenthol); peitho (the surprisingly wholesome god of sex, was kinda into the tactics of being a spy before he got distracted by p*ssy); and lumley (the dumbest baby lesbian ever o my god, she’s the daughter of a powerful river goddess and she still can’t get a date).

14. Introduce any other parties you have played in or DM-ed.

that would take me one million years.

15. Do you have snacks during game times?

yeah!! traditionally we take a halfway break at 9 and all go get snacks together, it’s great.

16. Do you play online or in person? Which do you prefer?

i prefer in person, but we play online a lot, and we’ll have to be only online once we graduate.

17. What are some house rules that your group has?

we round up score mods from odds and we don’t pay attention to like.. most of the little rules. it’s more abt the storytelling. (which is why we may switch to a different system if i can seduce them away.)

18. Does your party keep any pets?

o yeah, i think almost every group has had an animal companion. and if not, zach always plays a furry.

19. Do you or your party have any dice superstitions?

a lot of us roll specific sets for each character! 

20. How did you get into D&D? How long have you been playing?

i got into dnd in high school bc i liked a boy who watched community, and then i watched community, and the dnd episode fucking rocked. never got past making characters and one botched attempt at a session. then in my first year of college, i joined the dnd club and i’ve been playing since! so like, three years and some change.

21. Have you ever regretted something your character has done?

ya lol i play very much how my character would act and tho that usually goes well for me.. ko wanted to break his pact with aengus despite the Consequences and i didn’t. but overall i think the outcome has been a lot of fun!

22. What color was your first dragon?

silver! just introduced them, actually!

23. Do you use premade modules or original campaigns?

all original, baby.

24. How much planning/preparation do you do for a game?

a ton. as a dm i write........ a lot. i want to have a lot of vivid characters, solid plots, and a huge interwoven world. so my docs are always huge and take me months to finish. 

as a player i do less bc players just inherently have far less to do. but i still try put a ton into really developing my character so i can play them more naturally.

For DMs

25. What have your players done that you never could have planned for?

in my first campaign, i used a lot of weird memory spells to keep characters from remembering the big bad, because him being unremembered was a HUGE plot point for me. i had two different groups playing in the city at the same time, and one of them.... had this dragonborn who just liked to talk to plants and who hated nobles, and who fucking cast MAGIC MOUTH on their FANNY PACK to record that big bad so that it COULDN’T BE FORGOTTEN. MAGIC MOUTH. THAT’S THE SPELL THAT BROKE ME.

26. What was your favorite scene to write and show your characters.

i’ve really liked a couple, but i know i haven’t topped the finale for my first campaign. after finally the groups finally came together and killed Shargaas, the city began to crumble around them, and they all watched me set a ten-minute timer for them to figure out how to get away with their lives.

27. Do you allow homebrew content?

o yea, i adore MFOV particularly.

28. How often do you use NPCs in a party?

o there are always a couple kicking around.

29. Do you prefer RP heavy sessions or combat sessions?

we don’t really.. do... that second thing....

30. Are your players diplomatic or murder hobos?

yes.

For Players

31. What is your favorite class? Favorite race?

o fuck. uh probably wizard. and i love................. half-elves.

32. What role do you like to play the most? (Tank/healer/etc?)

i really like long-distance damage dealers.

33. How do you write your backstory, or do you even write a backstory?

i always start with a concept and then i just write an entire novel ell em ay oh.

34. Do you tend pick weapons/spells for being useful or for flavor?

done!

35. How much roleplay do you like to do?

like, 70% rp, 30% jokes,

[dippers-doodles]

Ok now that I've sat back to think about it more I'm going to ramble.

The inherent tragedy that none of these people (except Hildy) really got to see their kids grow up, and were forever changed almost purely for the sake of others. The dads in S1 are put in peril and have to face the Doodler themselves, but the primary goal is to protect their kids and to fix what their fathers caused. But you look at the cast of ATMOD, and none of the heros are doing this for someone.

There's Meryl, who is doing it for his comeback to the screen and ends up sacrificing himself to give the others a chance to fight back and save the world (he doesn't even see the Doodler, and is instead brutually murdered). You have Hildy, who originally is doing it for the story and her big break but ends up connected to the eldritch being and cursing her family. Robert wants so desperately to propose to his girlfriend and ends up losing his mind devoured by the same thing that kills his parents, but tries to his last breath to destroy the box. And then Stud Stamper, the man with dreams and wants who gave up everything for his family, banishes the Doodler but is insane in the process and ends up trapped with it, later dying in an unknown land.

The end, they didn't do it for fame or anything. By the end everyone knew there was no escape and they were going to die, but they fought anyway. And in doing so destroyed their families. Willy grew up without a dad twice, and already was messed up and no longer had a guiding hand to try and help him. Glenn's mom never even knew her father. Barry is entwined with the Doodler from their actions, which leads to the creation of Oakvale and his pressure on Henry. Frank never knew his father, or maybe Sally married someone else, but carried the last name of someone he never met because of a being that destroyed his entire paternal line.

Then this continues to the OG Dads and their relationships to their fathers, and how they all feel the effects of the Doodler and keep fighting it to save their kids, only to fail and pass it on to their kids. When I first listened to S1, I kept wondering why and how Willy connected to the other dads and why these four were chosen. I shrugged it off how you typically do when facing a DND story - the adventure is set up with these characters because those are who the players wanted to be. But the fact that they took it and made it less arbitrary, that there is a force larger at play bringing these families together, and that that force bringing them together wants to destroy them.

The Doodler entwined these families and has been destroying them and their relationships and their lives _and yet_ the OG Dads, the S1 kids, and now the S2 kids have this hope and effort to fight against generations of eldritch beings that wish to kill them and destroy the world.

The Doodler is all about randomness and chaos, but the families are about hope and the connections despite.

God, At the Mountain of Dadness really changes dndads in all the best ways.

[isolated-loser]

Log 0020, 4:44am, 3/7/2019

Eh!

So, shaggy chose to be at my table. And I may have had his Pc incised by a gorgeous cyan tiefling woman into abandoned building alone, where he may have gotten jumped by 17 other tieflings. Note fun as hell. Honestly, it’s been really nice having him around. Like holy shit an active experienced player?!?!?! What the fuck is this gift? Like, I’m not as into him as I remember being. Like I’m not saying he isn’t attractive, cuss he blatantly is. Plus he’s a really cool dude. I think my heavy drinking early in year changed my memory, of how much I was in to him, gods that was a bad time. I’m not saying I don’t like him, I think he’s great!

So, Mondays the 24th’s session was mostly exploding the main city during a festival, dude gut bit by some zambos in the arena, made to roll for infection, got really bad infection, other player are like fuck him and take forever to get him to a temple. Same dude fallowed some nice tail to an abandoned building, get the shit beat out of him, though it left alive. Many drugs are obtained.

Two players go to the red-light districted; one gets a fade to black with an exotic dancer. The other had gone outside to buy more drugs, and falls a nether person down a back alley, note he’s a dumbass, 9 other dude jump form thynn building top, amazingly is in beat to an inch of his life a 3ed time in one night, came back in dance club sees friend being ushered into back. Then he’s noticed by a handsome stranger, whom first thinks his a chick then there off to handsome strangers place fade to black.

A nether player saw them headed to the red light districted, was like naw and when back toward the festival flouts which he wanted to fight. A lovely lady asked if he wanted to get on the flout he was all the beasts, something, something, and she was like new these robos, he like ah, and ten she helps him on one. One of the other peps on the flout taped are dude and glitter did cover are man, monuments later he asks for a confetti spell to be cast, and are player performs cool tricks with his explosive weapon and thynn confetti. Are last player had just returned to the guild hall to analyzed a gifted rose amulet, to see if it had ofer abilities then what was stated. It was a fun session.

Tuesday, I went to paint jam like the usual. Saw a nice older guy, high key a paint master, so shall he be labeled. Note not the paint teacher, whom to be known as the Paint Guy, though, the Paint Guy didn’t show up as he was stuck out of state, but that’s inconsequential to the point of this. So, Paint Master, came in and did some paining and we chatted like you do at paint jam. At some point we start talking about DnD as nerds do, he asks about the one shot I ran a while back, told him it went well and that I Dm On Mondays now. At some point I told him I was just running with the players hand book, cuss I didn’t have any of the others, and he offer to send me some PDFs of some of th DND books, and I was like that be cool. So now I have the DMs Guide and The Monster Manual, which is just fab.

It was great seeing Nymph, she complemented my new hair cut a bunch. Which was really nice, she’s all was complemented my hair. She’s so fucking sweet. It was wonderful seeing her. I just love her.

In Lash’s campaign only 4 of us could make it. Though, we killed that son of a bitch blade singer, the blacksmith I punched turned out to be a badass asamar, I got a cool new item that makes it where I can casted scorching ray twice per long rest I believe.  It’d pretty cool. Still need to get some new boot though, lol. I got a long bow as well, some ranged damage, like I’m not proficient with it, but I don’t care, it’s a bow, I go pew pew.

I’m running a one-off Thursday, the 4th. It’s going to be like underwater horror, Haunted sunken ship full of kuo-toa with a kraken outside, was what I was thinking. I’m prohibiting elf, humans, half elf, & derivatives of, cus i want some odd races in this one shot.

I did the volunteering with the rabbit rescue, it was awful, I was hot, choking on hair, spiders were everywhere, I had rabbit hair in my eyes, and you know what? I’m glad I did it. Do I want to do it again? Not really. Will I? Probability. But that was only half of it. I tried to do some grooming too. I feel I did poorly, but I’ll get better with time. I just hope I made a rabbits life a little better.      

So…

Yesterday’s session, Monday the 1, was pretty fun too, though not as role play heavy. Are players whom got fade to blacks had to Rom For Stds, the one whom slept with a exotic dancer got crabs, the other narrowly expand syphilis. Some role play stuff, then to and airship run by goblins, a little while after they got in the air ship they fight some sky pirates, there leader the tall muscular man with sky blue Gandalf beard, wearing nothing but purple glittery booty shorts, saw that these dude be beating my shit fuck this and then just jumps ship. One of the player had set both ships on fire & both when down. Everyone survives. O like a dungeon no thinks, woops spick devils usher them in to the dungeon, and fight.

I keep thinking about Crush-kun, who shall be called Eyebrows from now forward, and I don’t like it, it frankly pisses me off, to no end. It’s not his fault, . I don’t know why my brain has to torture me like this. Honestly, I don’t know him super well, but here my head goes into fantasy conversations with him… I’m so fucking tired of think about him. Gods he’s just so nice, and attractive. I really hate thinking about him. No I don’t I love it, but I hate that I love it. It’s like dumping seawater in and massive gash.

Eyebrows hugged me twice Monday, idk why it was odd. I hugged Presh, and Eyebrows was like could I get a hug, not odd, and I’m borderline in love with this man no matter how much I hate that, so I was like yeah.  Then I walked over hugged him, then during he’s like let me put down my drink, I let go put his drink down and hugged me again did something a bit weird with his arms than let go, there was a joke about him not braking my ribs this time, cuss when I hugged him Thursday I made a joke about wanting a hug not broken ribs, note the hug was really soft especially in comparison to the last couple of times, I’ve hugged him. Note not helping with the adoring him thing… Then he said he was going to swing me around but didn’t because of the chair, the weird thing he did with his arm explained. Then I told him I thought his wolf necklace was cool, cuss it legitimately is, and said that he always had it, and I was like yeah I know I just hadn’t said anything, he said something along the lines of look at you noticing things, or something like that, I said something like I notice a lot of things like the irritating fact that you hair is 75 different colors all the time, he said something like sorry my hairs irritating but yours is so cute then he said what color his hair is, a few more thing were said I don’t remember well. Just fuck.

Gods, I hate that I adore this basterd. I know, I’m over thinking this, but I feel like he acts weird around me. I’d swear to all the gods to have ever existed that he’s fucking with me. This shit is really too fuckin much for me. These emotions are so strong foreign, it’d overwhelming. It’s killing me.

Wait that’s an idea! *runs to nearest knife* Freedom!!! *stabs self 27 times in the chest* *collapses*

So today I woke up depressed. Just fab right?

Then got dressed, packed my paint shit, and went to paint jam. Got to see Paint Master chatted & got to see the cool shit he’s working on. Got him to join discord, and in the shops server. Some good memes man, some good memes.

Now I’ve finished with most of what I have thought about.

Sighing Off…

Favorite song today: Almost Human by Voltaire, She will always hate me by James Blunt, & Catharsis by Motionless In White

Mood: Pretty good, till I woke up today

[tlatophat]

Lifting Restrictions

Recreating the Alignments - Part 1 Part 2   ||   Part 3

Okay, so everyone’s done their take on this at least once, and you know what, it’s fun to do, so I’m gonna throw out my own version of this.  Here is my take on the classic 3x3 DnD Alignment Grid! First, let’s get some key terms defined. Lawful - To me, lawful just means that the character follows a clear and codified set of objective standards.  A list of things they ideally will or won’t do, and a standard for behavior.  This code can be broken, but it will feel wrong to that character, and they will be upset when they are put into a situation where they must violate one of their standards.  Lawful may give too strong a sense of “Law” being the driving force.  I think “Principled” would be the better choice. Chaotic - To me, Chaotic is not ‘lol so randumb’.  It’s the antithesis of Lawful.  Where a lawful character has an ideal standard they strive to conform to, a chaotic character has no such high standard for themselves.  They only have their goals and philosophy.  In fact, a chaotic character sees standards, rules, and other strictures as impediments.  Chaotics won’t break rules for the sake of breaking them, necessarily.  They just don’t care for such things and aren’t going to even consider them while making their choices.  They act more on primal sensation than logic, making “Instinctive” a good alternate term. Good - I find this and its counterparts, Neutral and Evil, to be misnomers.  Good isn’t always ‘goody 2-shoes’ or ‘FOR THE GREATER GOOD’.  Let’s be honest, a kingdom ruled by a caste of Lawful Good Paladins isn’t going to be a very happy place for long. Additionally, a Good Paladin may not think twice about cutting down a tree, but a Good Druid might very strongly object to that, and consider it Evil... or at least worthy of a good lecture.  So I think Good would better be called Selfless.  A Selfless character will always make decisions with the consequences to other people or things in mind.  What those other things are will vary by the character, but they all want to avoid collateral consequences that would hurt others. Evil - Now, you might be expecting me to ask what the opposite of Selfless is and then apply it to evil, but I don’t think that fits.  When I look at classic examples of Evil characters, they share basically one thing in common: they aren’t necessarily the antagonists and villains of the story, but they all strive for domination and control.  Of others, of their environment, of their kingdom, of other people: They want to be in control.  So I feel Dominant is the better descriptor.  Their driving motive is to gain power and control for its own sake. Neutral - Ah yes.  Nestled between Selfless (Good) and Dominant (Evil) is this little slice of ambiguity that often has a horrible reputation for being mind-numbingly bland or pure off-the-wall bonkers.  Both of these misrepresent what I find to be one of the more compelling alignment sets.  Neutral is, again, a poor choice of word, in my opinion; especially juxtaposed against Selfless and Dominant.  What are Neutral characters after?  If they’re not looking out for other people (Good/Selfless) or trying to take control (Evil/Dominant), what are they doing?  Well.. they’re looking after themselves, and/or after a very select and small group of people.  They are Selfish.  Not necessarily in the negative sense, just that their frame of reference is their own well-being.  They don’t necessarily care about collateral, and they really don’t want to impose on other people either.  They will act for their own satisfaction, whether that be financial, emotional, spiritual, whatever. So, with those terms out of the way, let’s ACTUALLY do the 9 alignments and give you a taste of how I see them. PRINCIPLED SELFLESS - (Lawful Good) This is the home of the Noble Knight, the Holy Paladin, the benevolent King, the beleaguered Town Mayor, the Hunter watching over the sleepy village during the night, the Girl who puts herself between the victim and the bully’s fist, the young patriotic Soldier on the front lines.  These men and women hold themselves to a standard of action and behavior, and are always thinking about the well-being of others, even to the point of putting themselves in harms way to secure it.  Whatever their source of values, it puts a high priority on defending others and they are uncomfortable with, if not downright hostile to, the idea of acting outside of their principles, as they feel that doing so may actually hurt others around them, or make them no better than the ones they’re trying to stop. PRAGMATIC SELFLESS -  (Neutral Good) This is the Town Medic, doing all they can within the limits of their knowledge, but knowing that some injuries just aren’t worth treating when supplies are limited.  It hurts, but it’s necessary, and they are comfortable with shouldering that burden.  It’s the Upstanding Citizen, who knows they can’t face the threat themselves, but will scramble to make sure the authorities know what’s happening.  This class of character will do everything they can reasonably be expected to do to protect those around them, even bend some rules or take a blow to their principles if it means getting results.  But they’re not going to overextend themselves when all that’s going to do is hurt them. INSTINCTIVE SELFLESS - (Chaotic Good) This is woodland Ranger who poaches to feed the orphanage; the grizzled Bounty Hunter who kills his targets in cold blood to stop them from repeating their crimes; the Royal Assassin who kills the enemy general before his invasion plans come to fruition.  These characters just want to help.  Screw the rules, screw anything that stands between them and helping, they’re going to make sure other people are secure by any means necessary, and they will fight to correct anything they see as threatening other people, even if that threat comes from seemingly noble sources. PRINCIPLED SELFISH - (Lawful Neutral) This is the Merchant plying his trade in the capitol; the Blacksmith who refuses to do business with cutthroats because it would spoil his reputation; the Mercenary who keeps a blacklist of persons or organizations he won’t work for.  Characters in this bracket are in it for themselves, but they have standards.  There’s a list of things they most definitely will not do, and are very reliable and trustworthy because of it.  While this might put them in a bind, where their well-being may suffer due to their principles, they will staunchly adhere to them, or grimace bitterly if forced to cross those lines.   Like all Selfish types, it’s not that they won’t protect others or try to gain control, but they won’t do it to their own detriment. PRAGMATIC SELFISH - (True Neutral)  This classification is often misrepresented as being boring.  However, characters in this bracket are purely self-driven and that means this is a very unstable alignment.  Keeping a character purely Pragmatic Selfish is hard.  They have to frame everything in terms of how it will benefit or hurt them.  They’ll do whatever they reasonably can to promote their own well-being, and willingly swallow some bitter pills to do it, but they’re not going to stick their neck out too far.  This means they’re easily pulled along into other alignments based events around them, but this also gives characters starting in this classification the largest room for growth and the coolest potential stories.  Like all Selfish types, it’s not that they won’t protect others or try to gain control, but they won’t do it to their own detriment. INSTINCTIVE SELFISH - (Chaotic Neutral) These people will do anything in service to their own well being.  They don’t want control, and they don’t care about collateral, all they want is their own security and happiness.  The Sellsword who will fight for whoever is the highest bidder, the citizen who refuses to share his food with his starving neighbors out of fear of starving himself, the streetrat who steals to survive, the Deserter who flees the battlefield when he realizes the battle is lost.  These people have a finely honed sense of self-preservation, making them great allies if you can convince them that working with you is in their best interest.  But if you haven’t fully convinced them, they will just as easily abandon you.   Like all Selfish types, it’s not that they won’t protect others or try to gain control, but they won’t do it to their own detriment. PRINCIPLED DOMINANT -  (Lawful Evil) These are your Moguls, who play by the rules as they consolidate control of a market.  The Paladin who’s stopped caring about others and is only in it for the authority it brings.  The mediocre King who manages to keep his people content, but really is only in it for the privileges of the Monarchy.  Characters in this category relish the sense of power they have and thirst for more.  But they’ve got principles, and there are lines they won’t cross.  Sure, they can be controlling assholes, but they stay in line and play by the book.  At least, by whatever book they’ve elected to use as their rules. PRAGMATIC DOMINANT - (Neutral Evil)  You could also call these guys ‘Lazy Dominant’.  They want power, and they want to keep accumulating it for themselves more and more, but they’re not going to get over-excited about it.  It’s the corrupt Sheriff who just enjoys skimming the coffers every so often, the Commander who waits for a superior to make a mistake before trying to take his seat.  They’ll slowly, patiently accumulate power and influence for its own sake, using some dubious methods, but nothing so radical as to be called ‘grasping’.  They’re more... opportunists than anything else. INSTINCTIVE DOMINANT - (Chaotic Evil)  These guys just like flaunting the fact they’re in control.  They will get up in your face with that, and they will definitely have the power to back them up.  They like seeing other people bow or kowtow to their whims, and will take ample opportunities to demonstrate their power.  In short, these guys are assholes, and they love being assholes.  The problem is that if they’ve been doing it for any decent length of time, it usually means they have the power to justify their power plays.  And they’re always on the lookout for ways to get more power, by any means they can devise. So, there we go, my own personal take on the old RPG meme.  Is this useful, probably not.  Was it fun to write?  Hell yeah!  And being of Principled Selfish nature, that’s all that matters to me :P