Bruunwald's page

Clearly, many of you have never had a doctor tell you to lay off the weights and get on the treadmill. But believe me, this is a real thing, and one day, you will.

Strength is not cardio. Constitution is cardio. They are very different. Lifting weights will not help stave off disease. But riding a bike will. So will just generally having a better diet. And in some cases, for some people, NOT building huge muscles is healthier, since it can add stresses that some of us cannot long endure, and the diet necessary to it is one we cannot adapt to or tolerate.

I suppose you'll understand when you're older?

Put it this way: one does not go out of one's way to intentionally buy a chocolate chip cookie full of raisins just so one can have the "privilege" of picking them out one by one.

LOL

That's the simple, funny way of putting it.

The TL/DR version of the more complicated part of it is that I think highly creative people like to feel some sense of "ownership" in what they create. The more derivative a thing is forced to be, the less ownership we feel, and that lessens the sense of accomplishment and lessens investment (read: love) in the thing.

Additionally, other IPs act as roadblocks to the creative process. Writing around them becomes cumbersome and depending on depth of IP/crunch infusion, can require unhappy rules changes.

I think some of the latter is unavoidable when you are publishing third party material that is very genre specific. But somebody should not have to do that sort of extensive writing just to play his home campaign on his own table.

Rules as vanilla as Pathfinder currently is, avoid this issue naturally. Infusing fluff into the crunch creates this issue without exception, in my experience.

Additional question: Will this new edition advance the timeline of Golarion?

Better Question: Can Golarion PLEASE NOT be "infused" into the core rules?

I'm sorry that I am post-bombing this, but there is a subject that has just ruined my day, that I do not see enough people complaining about. (At least not yet.)

I assume from the announcement, that "Golarion-Infused" means that, as with Starfinder, the lore and setting will be in many ways inseparable from the core rules beyond a simple mention of the setting's gods in the cleric section.

What a horrible idea this is. This is the biggest turnoff of Starfinder and the reason why I've yet to run a game.

I love you Paizo, but Golarion is tedious for a lot of us, and so is separating fluff from crunch in order to get a simple home campaign going.

Vanilla is best. Core books should be resources, not advertisements or novelizations.

Obligatory Topic Derail Post:

Infusing Golarion into the core rules is the worst idea imaginable.

If they don't do that, I will buy all the new books.
If they DO do that, I will buy none of the new books.

Logan Bonner wrote:

Phylotus wrote:

DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

This is their new baby, their second baby.

What's Starfinder then, their adopted child? :-P

It's our child pulled forward into the future and then brought back to our time.

You heard it here first, folks. Starfinder is Cable.

Oh man. Are you bringing Liefeld on as part of the creative team also?!? Will we see huge shoulder pads on every iconic?

Forget the shoulder pads... will any of the characters actually have FEET?!?

Two Things that I ask (and I am sure will be ignored):

Please do not muck too much with the monster creation rules. The high level of detail in monster creation is one of the reasons I have stuck it out with Pathfinder all this time. Nerfing and reducing detail like a certain other game did will make me cry.

Secondly... Regarding the Golarion-Infused bit.

Please NO.

NO NO NO NO NO.

Campaign settings are for... well, for campaign setting books. They are not for rulebooks. Rulebooks should be vanilla.

The big, horrible bad weakness of Starfinder is that it is infused with lore that probably 50% of GMs - at least anybody with any kind of creative streak - must REMOVE to get any kind of home game going.

You WILL lose me, and I think a lot of other customers, if we have to wade through any more Golarion in our Core books than the names of gods.

I love Paizo, but infusing Golarion into the rules is bound to result in the sort of tedium that just kills a game. Bad, bad idea.

Militaries should love scrolls. You can package them, store them, distribute them, they're paperwork that kills enemies and if something goes wrong you can say the user didn't read the instructions and it's his own fault.

I would take that a step further and argue that scrolls in this case count as the aforementioned "ammunition" that seems otherwise easy to requisition.

Lol - he asked, didn't like the answer, threw a fit and left.

And the thread just went on and on...

The lack of spell components troubles me greatly.

One of the things I hated about 4th Edition was that magic required absolutely no components or actual in-game character action to perform. You can tie up a spellcaster, gag them, throw them in a bag, and hang them upside-down, and they could STILL cast spells. I've actually seen DMs resort to those extremes when an NPC captured a PC.

I don't know (or care) about 4th Ed, but since I was going to houserule that all magic was some kind of psychic power, anyway (I prefer my Sci-Fi without magic, if possible), the lack of components or magical distinctions is just fine with me.

Aside from the rare high-powered/expensive-to-cast spell, material components never amounted to anything in our game but a monthly upkeep of a few gold pieces. So this won't be missed at our table.

Besides, casting still provokes AoO. That's pretty much the most important part of any of that.

RE #3: Can we assume creatures with multiple natural weapons still get an attack with each during a full round (or its equivalent)?

I realize I'm late to the party, but waffles are gimmicky.

Pancakes are the real deal.

Waffles = gimmick
Pancakes = integrity

I suspect that the old Pathfinder classes would be mostly limited to "primitive" worlds, and would not be of much use in regular play. This will probably stem from the base classes in SF being at higher power level than the PF ones, if only because the idea of a barbarian in hide armor wielding an axe beating a power-armored space marine wielding a chainsword is just silly.(I believe one of the developers {Sutter} said much the same thing in the Game Informer interview.)

So you're saying that the ability modifiers are going to be +1 per every point over 10 and the BAB for melee types will likewise be +2 per level? Because without some similar changed mechanic, the "power levels" will be the same. There is no real difference between a barbarian with a laser gun and the appropriate feat and a soldier with same, if they are both human. Otherwise, the monsters (which are supposedly usable with no conversion) would not be useable.

Your comparison also makes no sense in that even in the 40K universe, a space marine is a freakish monster. Next to the average soldier of the Imperium or worker in a factory, he's a Large size Construct or augmented humanoid.

DrDeth wrote:

Jiggy wrote:

I had been under the impression that "grognard" was a dismissive and somewhat ageist term, and thus I try not to use it. Am I mistaken?

Yes you are mistaken, it is a badge of honor.

Hm.

Sure doesn't seem that way when used by folks who don't self-identify as such. But I'm glad to see this thread is going in a more positive direction than I first feared when I saw the thread title.

Carry on, then.

:)

Seems to me that the term used to be hung on any older player too inflexible and bitter to adapt to changes to systems (or certain new systems or game types) without at least constant complaining, if not outright rejection of same. The sort of secondary definition was somebody old enough to have been playing when many of the games and gaming conventions we take for granted, were first introduced.

Whether a person fits the first definition is largely objective. You can see them acting that way. (That is not to make any judgment on whether they are right or wrong in their opinions).

Whether a person fits the second definition is relative to their age and length of experience in the gaming community. I, for instance, already fit the second definition back when I first heard the term, because I was already a mini-painting, map-making freak before 1st Edition AD&D hit its greatest heights.

And by that definition I began to humorously refer to myself as a grognard some time back. But I have never identified with the original definition. I don't as a rule automatically like or dislike any new development out of some weird devotion to the good old days (even though I have very fond memories of those days). I tend to approach new things without the baggage.

What? No Gene Simmons jokes?

The third movie's action really bored me. It just sort of dragged. Good action requires stakes.

Agreed. Much if the emotional impact had been lost by then and with it, the sense that anything important was much at stake.

I would add that for some if us the butchering of the thing up until that point made the action even more exasperating and tedious. Like finding a beloved pet had been run over and then trying to salvage the situation by "enjoying" watching the corpse being dragged around by a car

I am super excited for this Bestiary more than any before it for one simple reason. One word even. KRAMPUS! I cant wait to see what Paizo comes up with for stats of this legendary creature. I hope they do some other holiday creatures. Samhain maybe. Also interested in a lovcraftian player race. March cant come fast enough.

Samhain? That's a festival, not a creature.

It's not FAQ worthy. The penalties are clearly different and both apply.

RE "Railroading," "Freeway."

Well, I would like "route" and "destination" to be clearly defined.

If we're using the terms in the abstract to mean "means of discovery" and "unavoidable conclusion" then, yes, that's railroading.

If we truly mean "road" and "location of castle at the end of the road, etc." then, no, this in and of itself is not true railroading. There can be a single physical path that characters must follow to a specific important destination within a world, and still have the freedom to make important, world-altering and personal decisions within that context.

You can frame an adventure in such a way as to create a boundary that increases challenge and actually provide MORE freedom of personal choice within those boundaries. It depends on the sort of world you're building.

But there are also worlds that MUST be built with these sorts of boundaries, or they cannot accomplish their goals. Real horror, for instance, demands some measure of what most call "railroading." Inevitability is part and parcel to the genre.

I think "railroading" is too broadly applied a term in most quarters. Most players and GMs are casual enough that they don't have the depth of experience with multiple playing styles, that they really can honestly apply the term or understand it in any context other than the negative. So the knee-jerk reaction prevails, and it is applied to situations that, if you look closely enough, are more complex than that, and it is avoided at all costs, rather than treated like the useful tool it can be (when applied rarely and judiciously).

Bruunwald wrote:

Killer_GM wrote:

The Norv wrote:

Killer_GM wrote:

I'm suggesting that a Secretary of State who has sold/peddled influence to numerous foreign entities and governments for contributions to the Clinton Foundation, which the FBI is currently investigating (unlike the emails) is deserving of incarceration if her guilt can be proven, which I believe it will be.

She has been investigated. Again and again and again and again and again. And NOTHING has been found.

So yes, you're free to believe that, and there are MANY problems with HRC, but I cannot understand this line of thinking.

Those investigations were inadequate, and continually hampered by Clinton and her cronies who didn't play ball, and an Obama DOJ who didn't even attempt to seriously investigate her. If Trump wants to go after her, the evidence will be found. Hell, 20% of US uranium is now going to Russia, and investors donated millions to the Clinton foundation. That example alone (out of many) ought to do it.

Again, the "information" you flush into our world through your toilet portal is less actual and more a confection of your lower bowel.

You need to PROVE your wild accusations. With a better source than some paranoid right wing blog.

Given that Trump was able to win this election, I don't think he does.

A bunch of paranoid nutjobs agreeing with their lead paranoid nutjob cannot vindicate a lie.

The Norv wrote:

Killer_GM wrote:

I'm suggesting that a Secretary of State who has sold/peddled influence to numerous foreign entities and governments for contributions to the Clinton Foundation, which the FBI is currently investigating (unlike the emails) is deserving of incarceration if her guilt can be proven, which I believe it will be.

She has been investigated. Again and again and again and again and again. And NOTHING has been found.

So yes, you're free to believe that, and there are MANY problems with HRC, but I cannot understand this line of thinking.

Those investigations were inadequate, and continually hampered by Clinton and her cronies who didn't play ball, and an Obama DOJ who didn't even attempt to seriously investigate her. If Trump wants to go after her, the evidence will be found. Hell, 20% of US uranium is now going to Russia, and investors donated millions to the Clinton foundation. That example alone (out of many) ought to do it.

Again, the "information" you flush into our world through your toilet portal is less actual and more a confection of your lower bowel.

You need to PROVE your wild accusations. With a better source than some paranoid right wing blog.

Killer_GM wrote:

The USA is done with the corrupt Clintons, who have no solution for 20 trillion in debt and how to pay for this failed socialist utopian dream.

Deficits go down under Democratic presidents and go up under republicans.

Tax breaks cost money

Wars cost money, and only make money for defense contractors and oil companies, not tax payers.

THIS is what's frustrating to me: a complete lack of a reality based throught process.

Thank you.

Looks like the market lost 4% of it's value in the last couple hours...

Yes, hilarious headline on CNN right now: "Global markets tank, currencies go wild and gold rises".

The USA is done with the corrupt Clintons, who have no solution for 20 trillion in debt and how to pay for this failed socialist utopian dream.

What planet are you flushing this paranoid delusion from?

I voted for Harambe, but why is everyone here acting like misanthrope Clinton would be better than crazy Trump? They're both terrible people who are terrible for the US and terrible for the world.

I know this site is hyper left wing (by US standards) but seriously. Pretending she's any better than Trump is willful ignorance and denial, which is exactly what got us in to this situation in the first place.

The painful truth is we US citizens really hecked up this time, even more than usual.

I do have to say I didn't think the US would ever see another republican president. The US right just doesn't hold the same values that the rest of the western world does, and the millenials and 90s kids certainly aren't voting right. I'm totally floored right now. But Brexit happened and they killed Harambe. I guess anything is possible.

Also, stop being so dramatic. This is not the end of the world. Maybe in four years we'll have learned something and our prime candidates won't be members of the oligarchy.

One of the hardest things to tolerate throughout this crapstorm has been the lame equivalency argument. Hillary Clinton is nowhere near as bad a candidate or even human being that Trump is, and is supremely more qualified, resume-wise, to hold office.

This whole equivalency thing is just a short cut to thinking. Makes people feel better about not actually giving a crap enough to pick up a newspaper and actually read it.

There's been a lot of talk about the Republicans being in implosion.

But we seriously looking at the Republicans holding the majority in Congress, the Presidency, and all but extinct in state and local offices.

You have to remember these things are cyclical and they boomerang, ultimately driving trends farther and farther afield over time.

The Republicans are imploding. They are aging and their mindset is outdated on the world stage. Their general policy is to accomplish very little and to be destructive when they do act. Their status quo (rich getting richer and power concentrating with the wealthy) is not something society can tolerate forever.

However, political trends boomerang. We tend to see a conservative backlash every eight or so years, as voters whip themselves into a frenzy and conservative elements take advantage of the unrest. Each time, they come back worse than ever; more repugnant, less honest, more determined to maintain the status quo.

But, eventually the anal clench relents, the country realizes that things always suck under a Republican president, and the vote swings back to the middle, and during this time, progressives move the "middle" just a bit more left and more progressive ideas become the norm.

I think we will continue to see this boomerang trend for decades, but over time the country will align itself in a more and more progressive way until we are more on par with the rest of the world. We might not see it in our lifetimes, but it will happen; the Republican party will one day be forces to either make a paradigm shift to keep up with the advancements of a more enlightened world, or it will have to die.

If our country cannot make that happen, then frankly it doesn't deserve to survive.

There are RPG topics that bother me, when brought up again and again, but not many RPG terms actually really annoy me.

There are terms from other tabletop formats (wargames) and related (hobby) that rankle me to no end.

Like "batrep" instead of battle report, or "make it pop" when describing a painting technique that causes a mini to stand out. One makes the speaker sound like a pretentious clown and the other just sounds perverted.

One new term that has sprung up in recent YouTube videos, is "cav" in place of cavalry. One guy must have said it fifteen times every two minutes all through a twenty minute video. My comment to that video represents the sole time I have ever threatened somebody physically on the Internet, if they didn't shut up (comically, of course).

You know what thread I'd like to see resurrected? The one where the werewolf dragon born monk/sorcerer/barbarian (or whatever he was) was complaining about his companions falling into the 10 ft. deep pit he dug all the way round their 20 ft. wide camp every night before tucking in, because they lacked the Dexterity to leap over it when awakened by the GM's nightly raids.

Gold.

Well, the next time one of them has the back of your favorite head up against a wall, and you've just told them Jack Burton has their check in the mail, just look 'em in the eye and remind them:

"Concern for life is not weakness. Contempt for life is not strength."

It won't change anything. But it might confuse them for awhile, and that's good for a laugh or two.

Here's another version of the same question: doesn't everybody replace core with splat?

No.
And no.

Most people I know don't know what a slayer is and don't care.

kamenhero25 wrote:

It doesn't matter if it's pre-written unless for some reason you have to run it exactly as written.

I pride myself in running modules as written, unlike other GMs who change so much at times that people begin to wonder why they invested in the module in the first place.

The only reason I'm even here is because the module clearly stated that she takes steps to counter the PCs' specific abilities.

It's respectable enough, I suppose, that you have a personal code you like to stick to.

But it sounds to me, from everything you've said, like the PCs are too overpowered for the module in question.

You can't run an adventure for level 10 - 12 characters taking equivalent level 15 characters and expect a challenge. You have to make adjustments.

It is a story hook thing, not a game mechanic.

Ever see "Stir Of Echoes?" The horror movie with Kevin Bacon? The "voices" are sometimes whispers, but more often visions which give the recipient clues, which he follows to unravel the mystery of what happened to the deceased.

There are many movies and books that use this form of storytelling. But the point is, you can find a class that can "hear spirits" technically, but it's probably not going to give you any mechanic that effectively describes or plays out what is actually happening to your character in a meaningful way.

That's up to you and the GM.

Probably all of this could have been bypassed with an acknowledgment that, for most of us, it is a given that the PCs are exceptional, and because of that, and in line with standard fantasy tropes/mythological tales/fairy tales/legends, their colleagues, opponents, foes, rivals, and mentors and special tools are equally rare, especially magical tools and spellcasters.

The exception would be higher magic campaigns, which can range widely.

That isn't to say that I don't enjoy reading through post after post of increasingly angry pedantry, bordering on a flamewar. Because I do, in a sad, sick way. But it is a long way around to go, to point out something that has been an instinctive go-to default for most GMs' campaigns for more than forty years.

Anytime somebody is repeatedly asked to explain his situation specifically so the forumites can help, and consistently ignores the request, and then finally just decides he is right, I know he is basically wrong.

About everything.

CaptPostMod wrote:

I assume it'll be most like Spelljammer.

I doubt it. Spelljammer is less technological than what's been described so far. The descriptions seem to suggest at the most a 60%/40% tech/magic ratio. Also Absolam Station looks more like a techno-crystal sky palace than the old-timey and animal-based design in Spelljammer. I would say it would be at least closer to He-Man/Thundercats than Spelljammer.

No. It sounds like Spelljammer.

No doubt.

I assume it'll be most like Spelljammer.

From the write up from Paizo themselves, this is exactly what it sounds like.

It certainly does not read like a generic, modern SciFi game.

Personally, I would have preferred a modern ruleset, closer to d20 Modern Future.

You can make a Spelljammer thing out of existing materials with just a little work. You don't need a whole new division/edition to make that happen.

Oh well. I'm already hip deep in my own Pathfinder Modern mod, anyway, so I guess I'll just get back to it.

You know, there's actually a flat earther who posts to YouTube, who, if I understood his bizarre ramblings correctly, believes that it is dark at night because the sun moves so far away it cannot be seen and cannot sufficiently illuminate the Earth.

I guess my players are an exception. They don't seem to have any problem using it in combat; either finding opportunities, or giving up their moment of glory to do it.

I used to have a player or two who you'd never catch "wasting" actions to help anyone else succeed, and while that sort of behavior might have been taken for granted when we were teenagers, it became pretty lame to see full grown men with gray in their beards still acting this way. Fortunately, the Natural Selection of our gaming group has weeded those fellows out.

I think it was partly an incident with a party paladin and a demon of some sort that convinced much of the group that Aid Another was still viable at higher levels. Those +2s might not seem like much in some situations, but when you are aiding a character who is made for combatting a particular foe, they add up quickly to a neat and tidy combat with much fewer resources wasted amongst the entire group.

What stuns me are the people claiming it's "getting worse." Since the core is the same as it's been since Day One, I can only imagine these poor unfortunate souls live amongst oppressive, fascist-like dictatorial Game Store owners, or a fleet of Satanic GMs who force them to play with every new splat book that comes out, and that they cannot decline to play the game at all because a Paizo-paid assassin has fitted their beloved pets with explosive collars programmed to detonate if they don't sign in electronically at their weekly game.

How can a thing that is the same get worse due to expansions if you are not required to use the expansions? OH... IT CAN'T.

For my part, I love Pathfinder for the same reason I loved 3.5: monster building. I love making monsters, and I love a system that defines them clearly so that they can be made to be balanced. I'd played D&D since 1981, and I saw no reason to give up what felt to me to be a system that had finally arrived at a place where I could fairly create the menaces I had long dreamed of building. I don't deny that the system overall can be cumbersome. But being old school, I don't let it drag down the flow of the game. If things need to move, then I just move them along, and the rules can be bent to do so... nothing different from how we always played.

The only systems I've ever played, where monster creation felt more Game Master-friendly, were the ones I, myself, created.

I'd like to make sure I understand the consensus. At least as it seems to stand.

That is that the only people who DON'T know how to design something for Pathfinder, are Paizo themselves, because they've never even glanced at all the work they've done for it.

Did I get that right?

Seems like that's all I've really taken away from this discussion.

Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock.

So I've read a few things that I'm getting a bit confused on. Namely, how CR works when it comes to multiclassing NPCs with NPC classes and regular base classes.

What I know:
A warrior 4 is CR 2 and has the basic stat array of 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, and 1650 gold.
A fighter 4 is CR 3 and has the heroic stat array of 15, 14, 13, 12, 10, 8, and 2400 gold.
A fighter 4 with PC wealth is CR 4.
A fighter 4 with PC wealth and 20-25 point buy stats is CR 5.

So, this where it breaks down to what I don't understand.
What's a warrior 4 with heroic stats? +1 CR? Is that even allowed? Or are you better off just adding the Simple Advanced Template for a proper +1 CR?

Break the two examples down into their attendant ability score bonuses:

A warrior 4 is CR 2 and has the basic stat array/bonuses of 13 (+1), 12 (+1), 11 (+0), 10 (+0), 9 (-1), 8 (-1).
A fighter 4 is CR 3 and has the heroic stat array/bonuses of 15 (+2), 14 (+2), 13 (+1), 12 (+1), 10 (+0), 8 (-1).

Those bonuses, depending on where they go, represent a better chance to hit, to deal more damage, to avoid being hit, more hit points, etc. If this were a spellcasting class, they would mean more spells, higher DCs, etc. This can merit a +1 CR depending on how they are applied. This is less like making a character and more nuanced, like making a monster. But it can be done. My recommendation is to become as accustomed to the monster creation rules as possible. The more you do so, the less these odd situations will perplex you. They're more art than science.

The rules are written as they are for ease of use of novice GMs. That's why they're so cut-and dry, and why they encourage coloring within the lines. But there's no reason you shouldn't be able to - carefully - draw up some lines of your own.

Anzyr wrote:

Also, if you are playing Pathfinder or high fantasy in general, then everything Pathfinder fits the theme. All fantasy concepts are equally fictional.

So... your saying that if we're running a stone age campaign, that the technology guide still fits the theme? That's ludicrous.

Until your cavemen accidentally stumble upon the Barrier Peaks.

>:D

125. Because there's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo... and it's worth fighting for.

Huh... I don't collect many modern day pregen adventures and I never play them. I write all my own campaigns. So I never noticed this.

I guess I assumed every GM eventually used a Master-Blaster villain concept (small smart guy, giant dumb guy) as that is a common trope in film and books. Or, that more people remembered Qesnef/Fenseq from White Plume Mountain (though he was actually not really... well, I'll not spoil it). Or that more people used the archetypal tiny mad scientist (another villain trope).

I have, and do.

Steve Geddes wrote:

I like it because it's fun and interesting (and because it's from a bygone era which I quite enjoyed and want to hold onto as long as I can). Different strokes and all that - I dont find "character power" to be a significant part of whether I enjoy a game or a specific PC - so ending up as a superhero or a sidekick doesnt really bother me (most of the time, of course, you'll end up a little bit better than average).

I agree it should be part of a game's 'advertising spiel' - it's a very different thing.

I suppose, really just want to know the appeal. I see no point in playing if I'm literally worth less then the goblin we fought two levels ago.

Worthless is as worthless does. My motto, since 1981, has been, "roll me up a little girl with a butter knife and I'll slay you a dragon with her."

I think the difference is whether you are playing the game or letting the game play you.

I call it a challenge, but I understand challenge to be a difficult concept for some people nowadays.

I simply disagree with the game designers. As for the undead being evil, that's impossible, based on the principle that they're mindless. It's impossible to have an alignment if you don't think.

Yeah... Okay.

I think you probably understand that evil in the game is generally a force acting upon the world. Thus, artifacts, items, undead, and other mindless things can be evil, without regard to INTENT, which is usually the qualifier of evil for real human beings.

Acting cute and pretending you don't know that won't help you win your case, since it's been a given in the game since about... oh, say... 1974. Specific alignments of creatures may have changed over the years, but evil has always been a... thing on some level... not just a decision. But a force.

Now, if you don't WANT to play that way, that's fine. You're going to find yourself doing a lot of rewriting and revisioning. You might want to prepare a fully-edited PDF for your fellow players to study, since treating Evil as a non-force in the game world will affect a lot of rules. But it can be done. With work. With lots and lots of work.

But that's you choice, and you needn't dabble in trolling to make it. Just do it.

As to the question itself, if I choose to take it seriously, I think a lot of fun could be had playing a non-evil character dabbling in evil things and finding himself corrupted by it. It's an old trope, but a good one. I prefer to keep necromancy evil for my own games because then I don't have to do all that revisioning. And it's gross. And it's unnatural. But mostly, because when you create undead you are enslaving something. Whether it be a soul, spirit, body, whatever. You are enslaving helpless remains and possibly binding somebody's soul. That's pretty wicked.

I had one guy in the game who had an encyclopedic knowledge of the rules and used it to his advantage in every situation, tried to impose rules on non-rules and story situations, argued often, stopped the game at times, was completely inflexible when it came to ad hoc rulings, killed momentum and spontaneity, and re-interpeted the rules to his advantage each time it suited him without a hint of irony.

Bad rules lawyer. (Bad! Off the couch!)

I had another guy in the game who had an encyclopedic knowledge of the rules and used it to help me clear things up when there was confusion, who helped his companions choose good spells and feats, sped up the time it took to find obscure rules, set the rules aside when really fun things were happening, liked ad hoc rulings for the spontaneity they provided, and waited until after the game to keep me honest by bringing up anything he thought might be problematic later, or might have been a questionable ruling.

Good rules lawyer. GM's helper.

The Fox wrote:

Rynjin wrote:

You might want to back up a second and recognize that you are essentially saying we should outlaw people being wrong.

Think about that for a second.

Nope. People can be wrong all they want...until that wrongness impacts someone else.

More to the point, who decides who is "wrong" on these matters? From an objective standpoint.

"I hate black people" is an opinion. It is a bigoted opinion, but it isn't "wrong". You can't prove to the man that he does not, in fact, hate black people.

Perhaps it is morally wrong, but I doubt anyone here wants to see the world after it has been taken over by the morality police (I imagine if would look a lot like Australia will in 20 years, if you pay attention to what's going on over there).

Clearly, nobody is wrong about whether or not they HAVE an opinion. That's just dodging the subject. Everybody has an opinion. We all know that.

But I call BS on the old, tired, lame, wrong-headed argument that keeping jerks in line makes the rest of us the bad guys. An editorial on CNN recently opined that people ought to be allowed to think and say all the stupid crap in their minds, and then they ought to have to face the consequences for doing so. And I totally agree with that.

But when you make that thought and that speech into a physical thing that affects the lives of others, you are crossing a line. You are now doing real harm in the world. And there is nothing - no phony "objectivity" shield in the world, you can hide behind, that will make that okay or mitigate your guilt. Objectivity is great for science, and it's all nice and well in an online argument. But in the end, we human beings HAVE to set standards and we HAVE to agree upon a mutually understood standard of respect and civility, or we won't last as a species.

Did everybody here take Critical Thinking 101? Yep. We all are duly impressed with each other's ability to debate objectivity and subjectivity until we're blue in the face. Hoorah - we're so damned smart.

So what?

How does that apply to actual human beings? How would you like it to be applied to YOU?

And by the way, this "Freedom of Religion" nonsense isn't new. Back in the 1960s an almost identically-named law was floated (and killed by the Supreme Court), based on the right of Christians to freely practice their religion by discriminating against, and banning black people from businesses, on the basis that the Bible advocates slavery, amongst other awfulness, and so they ought to have the right to avoid them, blah, blah, blah...

My response to this is simple: if you're not adult enough to be a part of the human race, you don't have to. Stay at home with your doors boarded up. Pout in your closet all you want. But the rest of us have every right to make the world better for ourselves. ALL of us. And we're too far along as a species to keep acting like little children.

Ok ... starting my petition to get GenCon to come to Seattle ...

Too late! Been bombarding their Facebook page since this afternoon with bids to come to San Francisco.