R. Doyle's page

300 is a lot of words...

And if you are writing a term paper - quality over quantity (as in, more quality, less quantity).

I did just spend a good 30 minutes fretting over a couple of commas mind you... and I still am not sure I got it right.

I make no promises of proper grammar in a post mind you.

Not a fan of the "Holy Trinity" system: 72%

That speaks wonders.

Not much else is terribly surprising. Lots of explorers and character customization is very important to those here.

I too hate the Holy Trinity system...

I like options - there should be no 'perfect' setup for every instance (such as 2 DPS, 2 Tanks, 1 Healer, 1 other)

This has always been one of those things that drove me nuts about several MMORPGs that I have played - if you weren't ideal, you just couldn't find a group that would play with you.

I would love to see the games play tested with a variety of combinations - i.e. all fighters, all rogues, all clerics, all wizards etc. and various mixes. It should be possible to be successful with each method, though a different experience depending on how it is played.

Ok, this one has a one-liner in it...

Another anecdote to amuse me...

Our party was travelling through the woods tracking a bunch of goblins. Thrilling, I know. As usual, we had been drinking our adult beverages while we played, because gaming isn't gaming without it. There was plenty of the usual amusement to go around, and our PC's were generally being very successful.

Our ranger, our glorious ranger, was doing some of the best tracking of his life. He rolled nothing less than 15 on the die, and was managing some incredible tracking scores. Since he was rolling so well, the DM was providing an abundance of information. This was not enough for our ranger though - he wanted more. He finally rolled a nat 20 and was asking every detail imaginable. The rest of us, having been playing for a while, but sitting and drinking for a lot of it since he started his sherlock-holmes-in-the-forest routine, were growing a bit rambunctious.

Ranger "Do I find any tracks?"
DM " Yes, with that roll, you find them all."
Ranger "Can I tell what they are?"
DM "Goblins... same as you have been tracking all along."
Ranger "How many of them are there?"
DM "At least a score."
Ranger "Can't I tell exactly? I got a nat 20."
DM "sigh... fine, there are 20."
Ranger "Were they carrying anything?"
DM "Yes, stuff."
Ranger "Heavy stuff?"
DM "Heavy enough to make some prints deeper."
Ranger "How old?"
Me "37, and his name is Dennis. Is that enough detail for you?"
Everyone "<laughter>"
Ranger "I meant how long ago..."
Me "Sure you did, I was just skipping ahead... now can we get going?"

To this day, he can't ask that question without someone laughing...

I know, not exactly one liners...

This little anecdote is about how sometimes the DM is too good of a story teller...

Our brave band of merry folk, having defeated several challenges that faced us, were feeling quite good about ourselves. We had defeated a couple of sub-bosses and uncovered some of the larger plot (at least we thought we had) and were on our way on the next leg of our adventure.

We were merely travelling from point A to point B at this time, with nothing planned by us in between. The next part of our quest awaited us in a defined place (at least to our characters) and we were promptly heading there by the most direct route - which happened to be a main road between two towns. We started feeling ill about something in the environment, but even in our alerted state, we could detect nothing.

We travelled on several more hours and were getting near dark. This is when most groups of adventures would pull of the road at a safe place and make camp. So we started to look for a good place. We noticed a road heading north into a small valley, and with the sun setting decided this might be a good place. Except when we reached the road, our eerie feellings intensified and we looked up the road to see... mist.

Our nature savvy ranger decided that a good roll would be able to tell us whether this mist was a natural occurrence based on the prevailing wether conditions or something else. He rolled rather well and it was determined that this could not possibly be "normal" mist.

It was getting dark. Our options were limited. But there might be xp down that misty trail...

Or there might also be something more sisnister than xp - the things you have to defeat to earn it.

We had defeated everything thrown at us. We weren't on a serious in-game time crunch. This should be a piece of cake. A no-brainer decision.

And we definitely fit that description.

It was clear from the description that our DM had given us that this was some serious mist.

So we ran away.

From mist.

And the DM took a pile of papers from behind his screen and promptly threw them over his shoulder.

Most PC's at least look at what is out there before making the decision to cut and run... heck, some of them even get into the fights that are over their heads. We need no such lessons - we clearly know when we are outmatched...

We had been campaigning for a few years by this point and were middling level, just really starting to fight demons. We were working in a city on the border of Tethyr and Amn called Riatavin, trying to restore some order to the area as the city was in a struggle after ceding to Tethyr from Amn. One of our compatriots, a half-elven ranger who I will not name to protect his identity... had broken off during a patrol looking for an assassin as I recall and encountered several minor demons. He fought off and chased a group of the little ones and was pursuing them when he encountered some of the noble city guard. Since we were all sworn special constables of the city, he enlisted the two human guards to head down into the sewers with him to finish fighting these demons.

The trusting human guards immediately followed him into the dark and scary sewers to battle unknown demons, so bold and brave were they. Since they were both armed with swords and shields, our archer ranger held the torch so that they could see in the dark, lonely, scary sewers. As humans, their eyes were not as good in the darkness as the bold half-elf's.

So off they go traipsing through the fetid darkness, whence they encounter a somewhat larger and scarier demon. The brave and loyal and trusting human guards immediately engage the foul creature, counting on the support of the brave hero of the city. The brave hero who shoots the demon to no effect with his rather normal arrows. The brave hero who realizes that he can not readily harm the demon. The brave and good-aligned hero who sees another demon approaching from the other direction. The brave hero who takes the torch and flees up out of the sewer... leaving the two brave and trusting and loyal human guards to be swallowed by the absolute darkness of the sewer that would quickly be their bloddy grave.

To this day, I still won't let him carry the torch.

Draconic... because of Dragon Disciple...

We have a house rule that all packs have quick-release straps. One free-action tug and it drops from your back, along with all the weight and encumbrance penalties associated.

Of course, you need to carry stuff you may want to access in a fight, somewhere other than in your 'pack.'

We have just found it somewhat tedious micro-managing the pack to keep your encumbrance penalties minimized.

R. Doyle wrote:

I never said they shouldn't make them in the first place. I said I shouldn't have to purchase them to get to the ones I actually want. And as for making flumph minis, if that is what people ask them to make, then by all means, make them and sell them, just don't bundle them up such that I have to buy a flumph to get a guardsman or an orc.

Although, I agree in principle that you should only have to buy the minis you want, if they don't do random packs they will never make a number of the creatures in the bestiaries. I would really like to have a set of all of the outsiders (angels, aeons, proteans, devils, demons, daemons, etc), and they will never be able to make all of those without some sort of collectible mini line. Now, I do really hope that we see things like a clamshell pack of 6 to 10 goblins, where you can see every sculpt in the pack. I looked at some of the Whizkids minis this weekend and I like the way they did the mix between random packs and visible sets.

I'm not a fan of reality, but I get that the 'random route' is a way to increasing quantity of minis. It may be that a compromise will be attempted, which at the very least to me would be an improvement.

I myself don't want 1 of everything - but I would desperately love more 'staple' minis.

I saw it mentioned in the thread about doing every miniature from an AP - that wasn't what I was going for though. There are some things you can hand wave to an acceptable standard, such as goblins, orcs, guardsmen, bandits, etc. You don't need to have exactly the right one for everything, but some sort of mixer pack is a great idea. I hadn't considered it to be honest.

And I wasn't even aware Reaper was doing pre-painted plastic minis until this thread, so thanks for that whoever pointed it out.

I just know for myself that I will likely skip most of the line of minis if I don't know what I will be getting.

This has been a good discussion for me though. I feel more knowledgeable for participating in it. (I can't say the same for many of the threads I have seen though...)

R. Doyle wrote:

Justin Franklin wrote:

So you want 24 minis a year (or so) that cost about $5 a piece?

Yes. If they are ones I would actually use.

24 good minis, that only cost you $120 is way better than 240 bad minis + 24 good minis that cost you a $250.

What if the distribution of minis was done better? So that you don't have as many crap minis. Would you spend $250 for 120 bad minis (or at least minis you wouldn't use) and 144 good minis?

Don't get me sucked into this ;)

I'm a gluttonous consumer, and I am also capable of rationalizing (despite many studies to the contrary) that something better is still better, even if it isn't ideal.

I want more control over what I get for my purchase. I hate the random minis because it was always a crap-shoot. I ended up buying the ones I wanted on the internet as re-sale specifically so that I could get them, and it was always less convenient than just getting what I wanted in the first place.

I don't want to be in the position of collecting "rare" minis that only truly benefit the resellers. I would rather hand my money to Paizo for what I want than to some dude who makes his business up out of buying 80 cases and then picking out the rare ones and charging a ridiculous mark-up. I don't have any of those in my collection because I refuse to pay $30 bucks for a single miniature - it's ridiculous. Just make what we bloody well want instead of telling us what you think we should want.

If they put forth the proposal for miniatures and then made what the demand actually was, I would figure we would all benefit.

Sooner or later we will get the 3d printers working with colour and then everyone will be happy, but until then, all we can do is vote with our dollars. And my vote is - no random or I won't buy it.

So you want 24 minis a year (or so) that cost about $5 a piece?

Yes. If they are ones I would actually use.

24 good minis, that only cost you $120 is way better than 240 bad minis + 24 good minis that cost you a $250.