I'm considering trying my hand at making some cheap papercraft minis for some wargaming in a computer game based world (specifically, Dominions 4). I've got loads and loads of sprites from the game (who cares about lowres when a lowres aboleth looks as great as this?), but am wondering about the feasability of printing and using these as wargaming minis. I have access to a printer that can print decently thick paper, but not cardboard.
Specifically, I was wondering about using some "2.5d" effect through making the minis either in three parallel layers (so there's a right, a left and a middle) or at a different angle (like this, but more primitive).
So, aboleth tend towards the arcane classes, especially wizardry. What schools and kinds of spells do you feel are most fitting for aboleth mages in general? Mainly from a thematic viewpoint. Evocations? Necromancy?
Illusion and enchantment are quite obvious in that they're already strengths of the species, but maybe other magical knowledge would be used to spread out, rather than focus?
There's been a bit of discussion on flight and the fly spell lately, which made me think of something I've wondered for quite some time. In my home games we've houseruled it, but would be nice to have input from others.
If an Ancient Red, with a fly of 250 ft. (Clumsy) and a fly skill of +11, casts Fly - what is their new fly skill bonus, and how does it treat rules talking about winged flyers?
Clumsy maneuverability gives a -8 to checks, while Good maneuverability grants a +4. However, only creatures with a natural fly speed gets a maneuverability bonus to their skill. It has a natural fly speed, but the maneuverability rating isn't from that, so how do they interact? Regardless it gets +11 from it's caster level, so it has +30 plus either:
a) -8 from clumsy; good isn't natural and is not counted. Total of +22.
b) +4 from good; it has a natural fly speed so it gets the bonus, which overrides the clumsy. Total of +34.
c) +4 from good and -8 from clumsy; the ratings are not exclusive and both apply. Total of +26.
The second question is, can you run with a fly spell on a flying creature?
a) No, because the spell removes that ability.
b) Yes, because you don't need the spell to fly.
c) Yes, but not if the creature was slower than 60ft fly speed before; if a creature with a 10ft fly speed casts Fly it still can't run.
The third question is how it works with rules pertaining to using wings to fly. For example, the fly skill states:
"If you are using wings and you fail a Fly check by 5 or more, you plummet to the ground, taking the appropriate falling damage."
If a dragon with Fly cast fails a check by 5 or more, does it plummet? Again, I can see varying interpretations:
a) When flying it is using wings regardless, and falls.
b) It doesn't need to use wings to fly, so it doesn't fall.
c) If it has moved more than the 60ft provided by the spell, or has taken a run action that isn't allowed by the spell (see question 2), it falls - otherwise it doesn't.
What do you think? Any other possible interpretations I've missed?
Hi! So, some background: I kinda love the concept of Battletech, the boardgame/miniatures game with giant mecha blasting each other and so on, but find the games rules to be too much. Love the art style, love the semi-gritty-but-still-heroic, love the politics and conflicts and so on, but the tabletop _introductory_ base rules are about 100 pages and so far it's felt more like playing BattleSpreadSheets.
So I'm messing around with making my own giant mecha game in the same vein as BT, simplified but not as simplistic as First Strike.
However, I want to be able to release the rules system publically on the webz, as copyleft/open source/creative commons/whatever. Of course I can't release the BT 'mechs or storyline, hence I'll make my own designs as well as a few guidelines for converting for those that wish to.
But the thing is, I really suck at graphics. I can't make a stick figure and get it straight. Srsly. And while not much artwork is needed, and certainly not at this point, one thing that is absolutely key is having a mecha paperdoll for making the sheet, something similar to this one. I've been looking around for an open source/copyfree one but been unable to find it.
Granted, this is a hobby project from a poor gamer and not in any way commersial, so I won't be able to pay anything for it, but you will of course be fully credited.
So that's why I'm asking anyone here who feel like it if they would mind making me a very simple robot/mecha paperdoll. It doesn't have to be beautiul or anything, just a simple outline is enough. But I would need it to be entirely copyleft (essentially, anyone is free to do whatever they wish with the picture as long as the result is also published as copyleft).
Thanks a lot to anyone who helps me, and of course you'll be fully credited any way you wish :)
ELDRITCH KNIGHT
The recent FAQ-reversal and the thread about it got me thinking about the eldritch knight, and how it kind of lacks an identity. It lacks the very specific and indepth flavor of the Red Mantis Assassins, and mechanically it's not only on the weak side but bland, having a concept that is shared by much more interesting options such as magi, bloodragers and certain bards.
So I made a homebrew remake of it. I gave it the barebones of a flavor while keeping it fairly generic, and I gave it kind of a unique purpose; instead of being the same "Someone who blends swordplay with spellcasting" as the magus, it is a warfare-focused armed and armored spellcaster with mainly defensive abilities and a minor penchant for blasting.
More specific design notes:
I dropped the number of levels from 10 to 8 - I honestly think no prestige class should ever have 10 levels, and certainly not one that is so light in terms of flavor. I considered dropping it even lower, but wanted space for giving it a few non-key abilities too.
Every level gives at least one noteworthy ability, and often a smaller more flavor one too.
It is with intent that I've tried to keep away from abilities that stack very well with out-of-class options; allowing heavy stacking skews builds towards cookie-cuttery; just look at current blasting builds which are heavily focused around wizards with a single level of dualblood orc/dragon sorcerer. Eldritch Knight provides an alternative to that, which while not as quick provides the same bonus and even at full caster level for the evocations. Had I not made the non-stacking clause, blasting would have been skewed toward crossblooded orc/dragon bloodrager + eldritch knight. That's still an option and gives you a much higher low-level damage, but it's not as obvious.
The same goes for the widen and lingering abilities, the power of them is pretty easy to gauge by themselves, but adding free metamagics into a metagame that is already heavy on stacking free metamagics can have unforeseen consequences.
The thought behind the Charge Weapon and Spell Parry abilities is that through this, there's a reason for it to keep a weapon ready but without extremely complex rules systems such as the magus' ability and without him needing to wade into combat. A weapon with Enervate in it is still very useful if an opponent walks too close by and you get an attack of opportunity...
So, I got the game a few days ago, and so far it's been fun. Been playing Brigandoom solo, first with Kyra (which was ridiculously easy) and then Lini (who died very quickly due to bad luck and no offensive power) and then started a game with my boyfriend (me Seoni and he Harsk) which has been great fun.
So far most of the rules have seemed pretty clear, and what wasn't I found in the FAQ. One thing I'm unsure of though, is this:
If I have a card that can be recharged to add a bonus to a roll, can I play it's recharging ability even if I'm not making the roll?
For context, last night I had a troubadour on hand, and acquired a boon (can't remember what right now). At end of turn I would be forced to discard a card as I had one too many. I'm wondering if I could simply have played the troubadour to recharge it? That would have been far preferable to discarding a card (I ended up discarding a potion).
So, I was considering the issues the fighter class faces. There are a lot of them, and some require quite complex solutions (like versatility in combat) but there are two in specific I want to deal with with this houserule: The fact that between level 7 and 19 there are no interesting class features, and the fact that fighters are prone to hog party resources in form of healing and status removal as to not be useless and/or try to kill the party when they face an Aboleth. So, here's my houserule, that replaces Bravery. Please evaluate and critique honestly :P
I'm looking for critique on both the ability itself, and on the wording - English isn't my main language, so I often have to do workarounds to make my points understood.
Defensive Training [Ex]
Starting at 2nd level, the fighter gains the ability to very effectively parry and protect herself from attacks, including magical or mental ones. She gains a Stamina Pool that is equal to twice her level. Whenever she would take damage, she may spend any number of points from this pool to reduce the damage by that amount. Whenever she fails a save against a spell, she may spend a number of points equal to twice the spell's level to reroll the save; this may be done any number of times against a single spell.
By spending a full-round action, she can catch her breath and refill her stamina pool fully.
Any archetype that replaces bravery, may choose not to replace Defensive Training (anything that normally is a compulsory replacement of Bravery becomes a voluntary replacement of Defensive Training).
At 6th level, the stamina pool is equal to
(Level + Wisdom Bonus) x 2
In addition, if her stamina pool is completely full, she may spend 10 stamina points to take an extra move action as an immediate action.
At 10th level, once per day the fighter may catch her breath as a swift action. In addition, three times per day she may spend 20 stamina points to lower or remove the effect of certain temporary conditions, as follows. This may not remove any status effect that would last for a full day or more. This is not an action and may be used even if the fighter is unconscious, dominated or otherwise mentally compromised, though the benefits may be limited.
Cowering or panicked to frightened to shaken to nothing.
Exhausted to fatigued to nothing.
Nauseated to sickened to nothing.
Stunned to dazed to staggered to nothing.
At 14th level, the stamina pool increases to
(Level + Wisdom Bonus) x 2.5
In addition, three times per day she may spend 30 stamina points to remove any single one status effect except dead. This is not an action and may be used even if the fighter is unconscious, dominated or otherwise mentally compromised.
At 18th level, whenever she takes damage she may regain a number of stamina points equal to one-third the damage dealt (minimum 0). In addition, she may spend 40 stamina points to take her turn immediately. Treat this as a readied action, moving her initiative to just before the currently acting creature. She may only take a move or a standard action on this turn.
The idea here is to:
1. Extend the fighter's life while lessening the reliance on healers.
2. Allow the fighter to effectively protect herself from spells and similar attacks, and making Iron Will less of a must-have (it's still useful, as rerolls are more effective with a high save).
3. Make the fighter have something to look forward to at higher levels that isn't just a numerical bonus.
So, what do you think? Would like some theoretical feedback before I put it in action and playtest in an actual game.
Saving Throw Reflex negates; see text; Spell Resistance no
When you cast this spell, you conjure a single ball of sticky mud and launch it at an enemy's face as a ranged touch attack. If the mudball hits, the target is blinded. Each round at the beginning of its turn, a creature blinded by this spell can attempt a Reflex saving throw to shake off the mud, ending the effect. The mudball can also be wiped off by the creature affected by it or by a creature adjacent to the creature affected by it as a standard action.
If I cast mudball, make a ranged touch attack, and hit, does the target immediately get to make a saving throw against the spell not to be blinded at all, or do they get blinded and make the first save during their first round afterwards?
The "Reflex negates" seem to indicate they get to do it immediately (rather than "reflex partial") but the text seem to indicate they don't get a save vs the initial effect.
Didn't know how to title the post well.
I'm currently trying to make a homebrew 'mecha game, based on the BattleTech rules but streamlined and simplified a bit.
The game will use both to hit rolls and hit locations, and I'd prefer the same resolution mechanic to give a result to both.
In the normal BattleTech rules, you first roll 2d6 vs skill plus any difficulties (being good = having a low skill number) to hit, and if you hit you roll 2d6 to see where you hit from a table. I want to condence those two resolutions into one, though the same numbers and distributions don't need to be used.
I'd prefer it to be quickly and easily understandable for each roll, since there are going to be a lot
Currently, the only reasonable idea I've come up with is using a deck of cards, the numbers 1-10 of each suit. This means when you attack, you flip the top side of the card and the number shows your to-hit-roll (1d10 instead of 2d6) and the suit shows where you hit if you hit (from four different possible hit locations).
The system seems functional, though not beautiful (it could look quite decent with home-made customized cards though), and so I thought I'd ask here for suggestions/input.
So, what's your suggestions?
P.S. I realize you can roll the standard 2d6 and 2d6 at the same time, but since after that you will often have to roll 2d6 to determine if there's a critical hit and if that's the case 1d6 or 2d6 (depends on location) to determine what the crit does, it becomes a lot of different dice rolls with a lot of different color coding needed, and thus I'm looking at alternate options.
So, I'm in the process of creating a homebrew setting, and one of the major powers will be an ancient empire of elves. These elves mostly use slave labour from dwarves amd goblinoids, but when they need to go into battle themselves they do so in forged and enchanted metallic suits similar to golems or 'mechs.
So im looking for a class, preferably a prestige class, that would work for this. Or perhaps a bunch of magic items/golems/whatever. Preferably the suits should be customizable, and of sizes somewhere around large-huge.
I have no issue with using 3pp or homebrew material, but would prefer free options (i dont like buying stuff online).
I could homebrew it myself, perhaps based in the synthesist, but I really dont know how to make it well. I want it to feel like theyre in a large heavy suit/magic machine, not just like a bunch of numbers.
Don't know if I should post it here or in the video games subforum, but here goes. Anyone here playing this game? I started some days ago and must say I'm profoundly impressed. I imagined a pay-to-win magic ripoff, but was met with a really smart, interesting and different CCG that really felt fresh and new in a way that Hearthstone didn't.
Linky
Anyone here playing it?
For those that don't, but might be interested, here's a rundown of the game, compared to Magic the Gathering since it's the most well-known CCG. Compared to Magic, and most other CCG's I've seen, it has mainly three huge differences in gameplay:
Mana lasts between rounds, but you only get two mana every turn, unless you have specific other ways to increase it. This means you have to consider whether to play a cheap card or "save up" for more expensive cards, and drastically changes how the game is played since the "mana curve" I was used to consider basically goes out the window. It also means you tend to have a lot more cards in hand, since you can't empty your hand nearly as fast. In addition, any card can be discarded to get one mana.
Creatures fight in three lanes, and leave corpses. Each lane can only have one card at a time, so you can never exceed three creatures under your control, or six creatures in total. When a creature dies, it's body stays as a corpse for a full round, which means that lane will be clear for the opponent to attack through. Managing lanes and corpses is important, important enough that there are cards and abilities solely dedicated to removing corpses.
Characters have powerful, no-mana abilities on cooldowns. Basically, there's six different "colors"/kingdoms, and a total of 21 heroes (three for each kingdom and three neutral, AFAIK). Each hero has three abilities that range from useful to very powerful, and on cooldowns. Basically, these are always-accessible "cards" that you can use every few rounds (between 3 and 7 depending on the ability) for no mana cost. Unlike hearthstone, the abilities aren't just a small bonus and something to do when your hand is empty, but instead are central to the deck building.
Also, it's quite social, because of the always-adjacent chat and it's a pretty nice atmosphere, for me as a newb it's been easy to get help, join a guild and make friends.
The nad parts of the game though:
It is somewhat pay2win, at least in the "standard arena", but it also has a "limited arena" mode where decks are restricted in number based on rarity, so you can play against others building decks on a budget (or for free). As a free player, I don't feel forced to pay to enjoy it, far less than I do for Hearthstone. It is a tad bit grindy sometimes though, but the single player campaign is challenging and interesting for a free player so the grinding is usually quite enjoyable.
Well, if anyone is already playing, or want to test it out, feel free to friend me over there, my nick is Sajberhippien!
So, do you have any favorite things to satisfy your sweet tooth (or fat tooth or salt tooth or what have you) that's a bit unusual?
Personally I'm obsessed with a swedish pastry known as punch rolls. Here in Sweden they're very common, but supposedly outside of my country basically no-one knows about them. In any case, they're fantastically chocolaty-marzipany-arraky, and if you haven't eaten them and get a chance to, DO NOT HESITATE (unless you're allergic to nuts that is...).
So what's your favorite unhealthy stuff that you want to tip us about?
So, me and my partner have our computers in different rooms of the apartment, and both spend most of our time in front of them. It'd be really nice to have a quick and simple messenger system of some kind, not unlike the old Net Send protocol which unfortunately doesn't seem to work very well on windows 7/8.
Any ideas? Not looking for something as complex as msn or icq or anything - the simpler the better, and the less it gets in the way the better.
In general, I find the zalgo creepypasta to be excellent inspiration for the great old ones, and if I ever run a campaign focused on the elder gods, I'll probably include Zalgo as one of them.
So, was thinking of making a bunch of NPC cards ready to just throw in some random stuff, much like how I have a long list of name and a long list of random facts about NPCs to generate something on the fly.
However, I want a picture to go with it, since it's easier to remember a face than a fantasy name.
I don't have the cash to shell out for the paizo NPC face decks however, so I'm looking for somewhere where I can get access to a bunch of portraits that I can print.
I don't know exactly how copyright law etc works but this is just for personal use, not to publish on the web or anything.
In particular I'm looking for simplistic, preferably outlined (kinda like this: link) portraits that I can print from my black and white printer.
Soon going to start GMing for a solo campaign with a friend, and they'll be playing a half-orc rogue. I think the campaign will be quite heavy on infiltration and sneakiness, and the vanilla stealth rules are kinda... weird. They don't work out very well when taken as they are written and I can't really find an interpretation that solves it.
So, do you know any good homebrew stealth rules? Thanks a lot!
I've GM'ed a fair bit before, but never run a solo campaign. My roommate is interested in trying roleplaying; they're in to both fantasy as a genre and various computer RPG's, mainly roguelikes. However, they're also quite shy, and don't dare play with a group since they fear being awkward, so I suggested we try a solo adventure or three first so they get a bit used to how it's done.
But I've never run a solo campaign/adventure before, so I'm asking for advice here.
1. Suggestions on adventure? Are there any good published ones on the web, or could I use an AP book with some alterations? I don't buy stuff online, so can't use payed downloads, but I could by an AP in a store or use open resources.
2. General advice on solo campaigns for a new player? I'm wondering a bit how to be able to pit them against just about any monster, and how to avoid them being too fragile. I do think they're interested in playing a druid, which should make things a bit easier (due to pet), but I'm not sure that's what they prefer.
3. Should I use a mythic tier, or hero points, or anything like that to make them able to survive better? I don't want to add too much as I don't want it to be too complex for a new player. I also want to avoid house rules, since I want them to be able to use the core rulebook for all their rules needs.
4. On that topic, I feel fairly sure I should keep the game to core rulebook only in the beginning. Is that a fair assessment?
