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Hey there, Tact! How are you and the family doing?
Hey there, Tact! How are you and the family doing?
My wife, kids, and I are mostly doing fine.
I ended up with some extra time tonight, so I'm still working on FaWtL-diving.
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Snuffleupagus was NOT purple.Hey! I'd like to think I'm easy on the eyes.
Granted, I'm not big, fluffy and purple but I can't be blamed for that (blame my parents for not trying hard enough).
I'm so glad you corrected this! Otherwise, I would have brought it up months later, and no one would remember what I was talking abou- aw, dang it.
(Still, aside from the "purple," cy gave a pretty decent description of me - "big," and, "fluffy.")
Ok. This job has officially gone off the rails entirely.
** spoiler omitted **
I really do not like 99% of the people at my place of employment.
Sounds like somebody needs some tough love. (After all, how else can you make a new "atrocity room," you know?)
EDIT: for clarity, the link is basically safe for work. It's a sprite comic.
Food doesn't actually go bad, something else just eats it first.
Actually, if it's milk, it does just go bad. Because we've preemptively murdered all the stuff that would eat anything.
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Teensy Valeros is doing the standard thing of deciding that food is "horrible", "gross", and "disgusting" before he's tried it, bursting into tears, throwing a tantrum, and demanding dried cereal.
And when he didn't get his way, sat on the staircase outside the dining room playing his harmonica sadly until it got taken away.
And I thought Hermione was a drama queen.(Dinner, btw, was a crimini mushroom, red pepper and Italian sausage risotto with fresh basil, and roasted asparagus (or "despairagus" as Val calls it) on the side. Not in the least disgusting unless you don't particularly like risotto.).
I am doing my best not to let it hurt my feelings. Hermione went through this phase as well (albeit without the sad harmonica) and now eats everything I make.
Pass me what Teensy Valeros turned down. It sounds perfectly delicious and I'm having macaroni with smoked duck breast, cucumber, green pepper and dried tomatoes for lunch. I'll eat it in front of him.
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Food doesn't actually go bad, something else just eats it first.Actually, if it's milk, it does just go bad. Because we've preemptively murdered all the stuff that would eat anything.
When you open up the milk, you re-introduce new, nastier things that eat it slower and stinkier.
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As an aside, how many people here are wealth by level adherents?The only time I've ever seen it used, as either a player or GM, is when a character dies and is replaced with a new one. The new character starts with the listed amount worth of stuff, and no one really cares if it puts them ahead or behind of the rest of the party.
I give them what the party has for WBL. Not fair for the new fella who hasn't been with me that long to get extra perks, no?
Equity...
Lunch is over and my sister took both of my children, plus her baby, out to Harry Potter activity day at the library so mom and I can keep working. She's either very brave or appallingly stupid.Sometimes kids behave better with non parents then their parents...
Mine seem to. I get compliments on them being "nothing but great" all the time from other people.
()
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Teensy Valeros is doing the standard thing of deciding that food is "horrible", "gross", and "disgusting" before he's tried it, bursting into tears, throwing a tantrum, and demanding dried cereal.
And when he didn't get his way, sat on the staircase outside the dining room playing his harmonica sadly until it got taken away.
And I thought Hermione was a drama queen.(Dinner, btw, was a crimini mushroom, red pepper and Italian sausage risotto with fresh basil, and roasted asparagus (or "despairagus" as Val calls it) on the side. Not in the least disgusting unless you don't particularly like risotto.).
I am doing my best not to let it hurt my feelings. Hermione went through this phase as well (albeit without the sad harmonica) and now eats everything I make.
I was always told that I had to try at least a bite of anything.
Now look at me, a finely adapted Gaming Hamster, able to eat anything that people set in front of me, no matter how disgusting.
** spoiler omitted **
I'll one up on you. *places a plate of raw sea urchin in front of Game Hamster and sees if he eats it*
Again if you did that with blue cheese I'd flee, screaming.
Sea urchin is quite strong tasting. Not everyone can take it.
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Teensy Valeros is doing the standard thing of deciding that food is "horrible", "gross", and "disgusting" before he's tried it, bursting into tears, throwing a tantrum, and demanding dried cereal.
And when he didn't get his way, sat on the staircase outside the dining room playing his harmonica sadly until it got taken away.
And I thought Hermione was a drama queen.(Dinner, btw, was a crimini mushroom, red pepper and Italian sausage risotto with fresh basil, and roasted asparagus (or "despairagus" as Val calls it) on the side. Not in the least disgusting unless you don't particularly like risotto.).
I am doing my best not to let it hurt my feelings. Hermione went through this phase as well (albeit without the sad harmonica) and now eats everything I make.
I was always told that I had to try at least a bite of anything.
Now look at me, a finely adapted Gaming Hamster, able to eat anything that people set in front of me, no matter how disgusting.
** spoiler omitted **I'll one up on you. *places a plate of raw sea urchin in front of Game Hamster and sees if he eats it*
Again if you did that with blue cheese I'd flee, screaming.
Sea urchin is quite strong tasting. Not everyone can take it.
I love blue cheese.
I like bourbon cakes... Also strong and bitter.I don't know that I have any "healthy" way of getting any raw sea urchin though...
And besides, there is a distinct difference between "able to stomach" and enjoying.
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If Arnold Schwarzenegger became a zombie, he would sound pretty much the same as he does now.
You know he actually has a speech coach to maintain his accent? Otherwise he'd have lost it long ago from being exposed to American non-accents for so long.
(He does this because his accent is one of his iconic/distinctive "things" that keep his fame going, akin to Stephen Hawking's distinctive voice - even though he could have gotten a better one, the stilted robot one was "his" so he kept it for public's sake.)
Boop.
(Though take anything from the "dailymail" with a grain of salt, I've heard said.)
Somehow I ended up hitting submit when only half the post was done...
Hey there, Tact! How are you and the family doing?
... how is yours? All your fluffy friends and wife? And you?
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so...about this yowling...I'm biased and prejudiced and I like it=D
It feels good to be bad!
Yes Good Good let the hate flow thorough you
Oh here's an example of yowling Mort:
(This really happened at work)
We're potentially changing printer vendors. There's some vendor and us politics business. So someone sources out a new vendor and next thing we have a new printer for trial.
Me: Trial? Sure. Time to test out if it can do everything the old printers can, so I can get my job done.
*scans first page, flips to second page, just to realize that the document has already been sent in black and white*
*starts yowling - hey I should be able to scan multiple pages in colour*
*figures the setting for colour and multiple page scan, tries again*
*moves on to next set of documents, only to find that the printer has reset to default once the job is done*
*yowls more, kicks printer with paw for good measure*
Colleague who sourced the trial printer comes in.
Me: Lists issues.
Colleague: It's not your job to figure out how to change the settings etc.
Me: (not saying it out loud) If the printer can't do the job I want it to do, perhaps we shouldn't even consider it rather then just saying it's not my job to figure how to change settings? Is it not better to find out the problem now, rather then have a problem free trial, get our printers replaced and I can't do my job?
*more inward yowling*
What is the point of having a trial period without testing out all the functions you want the printer to have?
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Teensy Valeros is doing the standard thing of deciding that food is "horrible", "gross", and "disgusting" before he's tried it, bursting into tears, throwing a tantrum, and demanding dried cereal.
And when he didn't get his way, sat on the staircase outside the dining room playing his harmonica sadly until it got taken away.
And I thought Hermione was a drama queen.(Dinner, btw, was a crimini mushroom, red pepper and Italian sausage risotto with fresh basil, and roasted asparagus (or "despairagus" as Val calls it) on the side. Not in the least disgusting unless you don't particularly like risotto.).
I am doing my best not to let it hurt my feelings. Hermione went through this phase as well (albeit without the sad harmonica) and now eats everything I make.
I was always told that I had to try at least a bite of anything.
Now look at me, a finely adapted Gaming Hamster, able to eat anything that people set in front of me, no matter how disgusting.
** spoiler omitted **I'll one up on you. *places a plate of raw sea urchin in front of Game Hamster and sees if he eats it*
Again if you did that with blue cheese I'd flee, screaming.
Sea urchin is quite strong tasting. Not everyone can take it.
I love blue cheese.
I like bourbon cakes... Also strong and bitter.I don't know that I have any "healthy" way of getting any raw sea urchin though...
And besides, there is a distinct difference between "able to stomach" and enjoying.
I personally prefer the milder versions of sea urchin though I can take the stronger ones some too. I'd try bourbon cake just because it uses alcohol as it's ingredients but suspect I wouldn't like it. I don't do bitter well.
As an aside, how many people here are wealth by level adherents?The only time I've ever seen it used, as either a player or GM, is when a character dies and is replaced with a new one. The new character starts with the listed amount worth of stuff, and no one really cares if it puts them ahead or behind of the rest of the party.I give them what the party has for WBL. Not fair for the new fella who hasn't been with me that long to get extra perks, no?
Equity...
Isn't always useful or relevant.
Equity is important when you have a bunch of people that hold equity as a super-important goal, or when you have people that don't know how to get along without it.
Financial equity is only important in situations where it makes an actual impact on the power of the character, and then it's only important as a method of ego control and bitterness limiting based on player attitudes. It's a quick-and-dirty rule that forces a "one size fits all" solution that kind of works on a bunch of people that have demonstrably different sizes.
... but that doesn't make it wrong. It makes it quite versatile and effective, but ultimately it can be either dissatisfying or very time consuming and math-intensive on the part of others.
How much is that rod of maximize really worth to the wizard? As much as the rogue's 27 "+1 daggers"?
)
WBL and equity can mean very, very different things, and most GMs find it easier to adjust things after-the-fact, especially when a new character is introduced into the narrative that wasn't intended. "Well, technically they all have the same value, but it's pretty clear that Rick is feeling bad that Fighty McFighterpants is kind of sucking compared to Rangee the Ranger. I should slip in an item that works well for Fighty, but less for the rest of the melee folk, that helps bring his over-all abilities closer to being 'in-line' with the main group." is also a method of figuring out and applying equity within a game system.
Of course, as with any system relying on people, you can't always do that. Some people will decry it as "favoritism" and intentionally gimp characters to gain more stuff (a stupid tactic, as the "stuff" in question is literally only putting a creature closer to par, rather than above it, as you can do with most any class, but people aren't logical or smart, at times), or perhaps you just have someone obsessed with financial equity, nevermind that one character has no method of contributing while another has ALL the power to contribute.
So equity of finances really isn't that good of a metric - it's okay to start with, but that's why many GMs go, "WBL is close enough, until I figure how to balance things" and start to adjust as they go.
It heavily depends on group make up and skill level and nature.
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As I said what the AP says you get, you get. So why should the new guy, who hasn't done anything more then the rest of the party (and has in fact done less), get more then the current party members? That isn't fair. So you'll get what the party gets. That's it.
I don't bother to balance items or whatsoever. Ain't my business.
That rod of maximize for a wizard is worth less, because if I were that wizard, I rarely go evoker, so please pass me a rod of persistent metamagic, or dazing instead.
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I have no ranks in sense motive. Period. I'm as insensitive as a lump of wood.Do I get that when I become a mom? Cos I don't feel very psychic at the moment.Crookshanks has learned a very valuable lesson about the futility of trying to hide stuff from her mother.Doesn't she know? All mothers are psychic.Oh, trust me! When you raise a child from birth, you get an inherent +20 bonus to Sense Motive checks on that child.
It's really pretty alarming how easy it is for me to say, "That's a lie. That's the truth. He's hiding something" for both Impii.
And it frequently extends to a +10 Sense Motive against all kids in your kids' age group, making them fear and dread you.
Sounds like you could be a harem anime protagonist!
(I don't know if there are female protagonist for harem anime, but I feel certain there are, somewhere, and the Freehold knows them, and which ones to recommend or avoid.)
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Somehow I ended up hitting submit when only half the post was done...
Hey there, Tact! How are you and the family doing?... how is yours? All your fluffy friends and wife? And you?
I am doing as well as can be. The wife is doing ok too. My Mom is going stir crazy, so I am not looking forward to the next 6 months or so. The dogs and cats are as spoiled as ever.
As I said what the AP says you get, you get. So why should the new guy, who hasn't done anything more then the rest of the party (and has in fact done less), get more then the current party members? That isn't fair. So you'll get what the party gets. That's it.
I don't bother to balance items or whatsoever. Ain't my business.
That rod of maximize for a wizard is worth less, because if I were that wizard, I rarely go evoker, so please pass me a rod of persistent metamagic, or dazing instead.
Oh, man, if you're using it for evocation, you're just using it wrrroooonnnng.
But you're missing the point: you're both presupposing that everyone in the party has a currently-equal distribution, and suggesting that you, the GM, actively do a lot more work, specifically math, by auditing each person's character sheet. And if they're not equal? You... what? Shift coins around for your players? How you know how much to give?
You also might be presupposing something else I'm missing.
So let's put forth three scenarios:
SCENARIO 1
Level five party
Each person has exactly 3/4 WBL, because, despite their best efforts, the dice have been against them, and they have just missed treasure. Because of this lower-than-standard distribution, Wizzy the Wizard ended at the blade of a bugbear. At this point, the party just can't afford a resurrection, and you either have the player sit out for however many sessions until the dude can be rev'd, or let him bring in a new dude.
- does he start with WBL, helping the party out?
- does he start with 3/4 WBL?
- does he start with half WBL, presupposing the party sells every scrap of their deceased comrade's loot and turns it over to a complete stranger, leading to 3/8+4/8 = 7/8 WBL?
- Or maybe, if the goal is equity, start him with 3/8 WBL? Then he'll be at 3/4 like everyone else.
- does he start with absolutely nothing, harming the party's ability to keep him alive by forcing them to spend more of their limited resources?
- something else?
SCENARIO 2
Level twelve party
Due to various wise or unwise purchases, the party currently has a distribution as follows:
- cleric: standard
- fighter: 1.25 times standard
- rogue: half
- wizard: double
The rogue, as it happens eventually eats it (bad choice, going up front in battle). The death is pretty much the most recent in a long string of frustrating upsets on the part of the rogue. Bad rolls, some bad decisions, and basically he's little more than a guy that follows the three heroes around. So, tired and frustrated, he quits the game. A new gal is recruited and joins. Her character concept is a famous bard from wealthy parentage who has achieved great acclaim from both her stories and personality - and her own detailed adventures. This is backed up by mechanics - leadership feat, high charisma, maxed out bluff/diplomacy/intimidate/sense motive/acrobatics/etc., and a solid selection of spells. She has heard of the heroes' journey and was always interested in their quest, but decides to join up with these heroes both to enhance her own legend and to help them defeat the nefarious fiend. How much money does she start with?
SCENARIO 3
Level eighteen party
Due to standard max out of Perception, Diplomancy, leadership, and crafting, and the typical distribution of Paizo wealth, and a timeless demiplane with time stop use, everyone has (at least) 4.5 times the standard WBL (secretly it should be much more, but they're generous and have given a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge amount to various NPCs). A player unfortunately moves away, or drops out due to life stuff. Because the system presumes that there are four people, and none of the remaining folk are conjurerers, a new one comes in. What kind of money does the new one have and why?
Now, there are a massive amount of other scenarios that could come up, but hopefully this rather diverse set of three can get us on the same page as to why we'd make the decisions we do.
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Same as party in all 3 occasions. You get what they get, roll with it, matter settled.
In scenario 2, same as party =old party wealth added up(before rogue left)/ number of players(4) to determine what the new gal gets.
Saves me all that thinking =D
Generally for my games you bury your dead comrades with their loot,or if you don't I'll just do some spontaneous loot disintegration when anyone else picks it up.
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It's always interesting/depressing to watch just how much American society is geared towards encouraging self-destructive behavior.
"No, thank you! I'm full!"
"Oh, I'm sure you can find room for just one more piece! It's delicious!"And yet again on the chaperoning trip, I got the usual:
"I'm going to get a bottle of wine for all the chaperones. What do you think I should get?"
"I really don't know, but the champagne is probably a good call."
"No, I'm going to get a dessert wine."
"That sounds fine. I won't be drinking it in any case."
"Oh, that's NOT OK, you have to drink."
"No. I don't drink."
"Well, you're going to have to have a little, just this once."
"No. I'm a recovering alcoholic. I will not be having any."
"Oh. OK."The idea that it's not OK to refuse alcohol is really amazingly prevalent in U.S. society. Even the choir director, who went dry for a year, experienced it and described it as incredibly awkward, as there are so many social situations where drinking is considered "required". She described being pressured into drinking on one occasion because the hosts would find it "unacceptably rude" if she refused.
Considering last time I tried to go dry I made it 289 days before trying "just a little" just to be polite and falling off the wagon for another entire year as a result, I'm at the point in my life where I'll walk out of a place and be considered a rude a$$hat rather than make any attempt to be "polite".
Respect my life choices, thanks.
It really, really is.
Nearly drove my in-laws (at the time future-in-laws) mad by being a teetotaler.
... nevermind the fact that their daughter was the teetotaler and was the one most going to bat to say, "NO alcohol at our wedding, thanks. >:I"
I (rather wisely, I think) mostly just stuck to shrugging, noting that I agreed with my then-fiance (now wife of thirteen years!) and kind of exiting or redirecting the conversation as much as I could.
(Curiously, my parents had a strikingly similar conversation with my mom's parents when my parents got married decades ago.)
(In the end, they totally went with it, fielded all of three questions from several hundred people about where the bar was, and over-all it has been noted as "one of the best wedding parties" by quite a few of our friends and family. So... it worked!)
Same as party in all 3 occasions. You get what they get, roll with it, matter settled.
In scenario 2, same as party =old party wealth added up(before rogue left)/ number of players(4) to determine what the new gal gets.
Saves me all that thinking =D
Generally for my games you bury your dead comrades with their loot,or if you don't I'll just do some spontaneous loot disintegration when anyone else picks it up.
... so you'd actually audit everyone's character sheet, look up the price value of everything they have, and then go through all of that math, rather than look at the value printed for you in the book (which is actually a rule, if a soft one) and just hand them that?
You must like math a lot!
On a complete lark, I've decided to share a pair of tidbits from my SWEU PbP project. It's just the link to the posts portion of an alias of mine, but I figured a little HoloNet News Network action might brighten some days! (In other words, this is just another shameless plug.)
If you haven't played KotOR II, the newest one may not mean as much, but you might still get a kick out of it. For sake of clarity, the timestamp on those posts is circa 3948 BBY.
Heh.
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Same as party in all 3 occasions. You get what they get, roll with it, matter settled.
In scenario 2, same as party =old party wealth added up(before rogue left)/ number of players(4) to determine what the new gal gets.
Saves me all that thinking =D
Generally for my games you bury your dead comrades with their loot,or if you don't I'll just do some spontaneous loot disintegration when anyone else picks it up.
... so you'd actually audit everyone's character sheet, look up the price value of everything they have, and then go through all of that math, rather than look at the value printed for you in the book (which is actually a rule, if a soft one) and just hand them that?
You must like math a lot!
Yes I would, because the scales must be balanced. Duty is heavier than a mountain.
I've called players out before on claiming they had more gold then they had, and given them the calculations showing why. Yes, I hate Maths, but if I need to do it to do my duty as a GM, I will.
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I mean I don't know much about drinking, but if people want to drink, I don't see an issue with that.The problem, at least in parts of the US and with certain groups, is the opposite of this.
There is an expectation by some people that if some people are drinking, everyone MUST drink. And if you refuse to drink - regardless of your reasons, with the occasional exception of being a recovering alcoholic, that and "I'm the designated driver" are the only answers I've seen consistently get people to back off - you are very, very, VERY roughly pressured to do so anyway.
And I do mean, regardless of your reasons. If you have a moral reason for not drinking, the response is usually "One drink won't hurt you, you need to loosen up!". Medical reasons are usually met with the same, again unless it's dealing with an addiction. Personal dislike is met with "You just need to find the kind of alcohol you like!". Etc. etc. etc.
This is really a beautiful summary of U.S. drinking culture.
Poor Lara Croft Guy is a "super taster"; his taste buds are hyper-sensitive, and he has trouble finding foods that are bland enough that he can eat them. Anything with alcohol in it tastes like solvent to him.
Yet he is constantly pressured to drink at social gatherings (work parties, etc.), because, "I can't tolerate the taste," isn't considered a "valid" excuse.
Ugh.
Same as party in all 3 occasions. You get what they get, roll with it, matter settled.
In scenario 2, same as party =old party wealth added up(before rogue left)/ number of players(4) to determine what the new gal gets.
Saves me all that thinking =D
Generally for my games you bury your dead comrades with their loot,or if you don't I'll just do some spontaneous loot disintegration when anyone else picks it up.
... so you'd actually audit everyone's character sheet, look up the price value of everything they have, and then go through all of that math, rather than look at the value printed for you in the book (which is actually a rule, if a soft one) and just hand them that?
You must like math a lot!
Yes I would, because the scales must be balanced. Duty is heavier than a mountain.
I've called players out before on claiming they had more gold then they had, and given them the calculations showing why. Yes, I hate Maths, but if I need to do it to do my duty as a GM, I will.
So, your Duty is:
- 1) violate the rules of which you strive to uphold- 2) engage in math that you hate
- 3) to make people feel bad about things they previously felt fine about
- 4) to make it less likely that your group succeeds at a story-telling game
- 5) for the sake of an arbitrary story-telling exercise?
... cool. Sounds legit!
For real, though, it sounds actually legitimate, despite my glib tone.
I'm just pointing out that in your attempt to follow the "law" as you - individually () - perceive it, you violate the rules as many others see them by doing work you hate for the sake of a dubious "balance" either to make sure everyone feels good about things they already felt good about - meaning your work doesn't do anything - or for the sake of story-stuff - meaning you're ignoring the rules for story-reasons. Neither of these are wrong, and it certainly aligns with Lawful, but it's a point of contention among Lawful people, too. Which is the point.
Many people feel the same as you, but what you perceive as your duty may actually be the opposite of it for other groups - a fact that you may well be aware of, but an important point of clarification, nonetheless.
And now I know what you mean!
... but yeah, I wouldn't bother with that, because it doesn't really matter and won't affect internal or external balance all that much, and forces both me and the other person to do a lot more work for a lot less fun, in my experiences with similar situations and attempts.
I have no ranks in sense motive. Period. I'm as insensitive as a lump of wood.Do I get that when I become a mom? Cos I don't feel very psychic at the moment.Crookshanks has learned a very valuable lesson about the futility of trying to hide stuff from her mother.Doesn't she know? All mothers are psychic.Oh, trust me! When you raise a child from birth, you get an inherent +20 bonus to Sense Motive checks on that child.
It's really pretty alarming how easy it is for me to say, "That's a lie. That's the truth. He's hiding something" for both Impii.
And it frequently extends to a +10 Sense Motive against all kids in your kids' age group, making them fear and dread you.
Sounds like you could be a harem anime protagonist!
(I don't know if there are female protagonist for harem anime, but I feel certain there are, somewhere, and the Freehold knows them, and which ones to recommend or avoid.)
OH~! DUH! Of course!
Ouran Highschool Host Club! She's even studying to be a lawyer! Now all you have to do is join the local Host club...
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- 1) violate the rules of which you strive to uphold
I don't feel that new guys should get more then the group. It would cause the group to go, oh why don't I just reroll to get WBL. As for why people don't get WBL, well, that's the way the AP was written so don't look at me.
- 2) engage in math that you hate
If it needs to be done, it needs to be done.
- 3) to make people feel bad about things they previously felt fine about
You shouldn't claim wealth you do not own. And if there are mistakes in calculations my lawful side has to point it out.
- 4) to make it less likely that your group succeeds at a story-telling game
What the AP says is what you get. Whether you succeed or not - *shrugs indifferently*
Honestly most APs are rather railroadish. Just as well since I don't do deviations well.
The reason why I've never tried to balance things is because I believe I will just screw it up further and irritate the gaming group so I can't be arsed. What makes me think that changes I make are better then an AP writer who has lots of experience under his hat?
Happy bdae NH!LOL! Thanks, but you're 50 days early! Or 315 days late! Take your pick! (315 days late on my 50th, 50 days early on my 51st)
Happy *does quick math* early-by-thirteen-days birthday and/or sobriety day!
"Thirty days has September..."
April 30
May 31
June 30 (well, the 6th, as it's 3:46 AM here)
So 1 (4/30) + 31 (May) + 6 (today) = 38...
50-38 = 20-8 = 12?
It's either 12 or 13...
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Just remember that 1 + 1 = 11
I don't feel that new guys should get more then the group. It would cause the group to go, oh why don't I just reroll to get WBL. As for why people don't get WBL, well, that's the way the AP was written so don't look at me.
THIS is the real issue. Everything else is window-dressing.
See, you see the players as having no incentive to invest in their characters accept as a bundle of mathematics.
That's legitimate, because many players do, in fact, view their characters in that fashion, but that is not really true in many groups, and, in many, the presupposition that it works that way will actively harm, not only the enjoyment of the players, but also their ability to play the game at all.
You presuppose that the players effectively treat their characters as disposable - or feel compelled to treat their characters as disposable - because stuff is more important than character. I have rarely encountered that since the 3E era.
And, in the first case, when we were really struggling due to low WBL (more or less on incident) I would have dearly preferred our GM to give the new guy actual WBL so the rest of us could benefit. Unfortunately, he thought like you, edited everything on our sheets, and gave the new guy the same handicap. New guy quickly died and decided he didn't like playing these sorts of games.
to be done, it needs to be done.
Absolutely! But much like our "heroism" conversation, earlier, acting without understanding the situation can be exceptionally foolish - simply leaping into action without weighing in the costs can lead to outcomes that are undesirable by everyone.
You shouldn't claim wealth you do not own. And if there are mistakes in calculations my lawful side has to point it out.
1) If you're saying he just misestimated the amount of gold his gear is worth, unless that's a specific plot element (selling it to rez someone, say), it's really a wasted effort. That's not lawful, it's meaningless. If you're saying he was trying to spend coins he doesn't have, that's fair.
What the AP says is what you get. Whether you succeed or not - *shrugs indifferently*
... that... isn't even remotely true. Most APs have a large amount of variance in what they give out, and I explicitly pointed out in group one that the variance from the expected norm was due entirely to bad luck on the group's part, not any real issues involved.
What's more, if you suggest that you're just trying to go by the AP's suggested guidelines of what you get, you should be awarding 125% of WBL to the new guy.
Honestly most APs are rather railroadish. Just as well since I don't do deviations well.
Some are, some aren't. Your limitations are valid and worth knowing. But...
The reason why I've never tried to balance things is because I believe I will just screw it up further and irritate the gaming group so I can't be arsed. What makes me think that changes I make are better then an AP writer who has lots of experience under his hat?
... because s/he has no idea who your players are, what your table is like, and what's happening within your story. That AP writer creates a generic template that hews in a certain direction and with certain elements placed there in order to best maximize his understanding of how most groups play the game... but his understanding is necessarily biased and cannot contain or understand the experiences of each individual table.
Also, the rules suggest that you, the GM, should alter them (which, incidentally, validates your abandoning the WBL element). This means that your job is to make the game functional - whatever that means to your group. And what it means to your group is going to vary based on a huge host of factors, none of which can be easily encompassed by a single post. But the fact is, a person is not (necessarily) being arrogant by suggesting that they know more than the expert that designed the game, because the expert that designed it doesn't know what your group is like.
Trust me, that last drove me up a wall for a while, too, and I kind of smacked face-first into it during Serpent Skull, specifically when I was wondering what a particular weapon was supposed to be - one entry implied one thing, but some images clearly implied something entirely different, and a different snippet made both unlikely for a different reason. So I went to the authors and, repeatedly, was told, "Yeah, make something up. We don't know your group, and it didn't come up, so just make something that works for you."
That... drove me nuts. NUTS. ()
But the reason they handwaved that back to me was: it didn't matter. It wasn't important. WBL wasn't important. The weapon, even though it was a story element, wasn't important. The name could have been "unobtanium" and it wouldn't have affected the story (albeit with a silly tone). It could have been the world's most deadly doily, and it would be fine (if silly). Because none of that stuff impacted either balance or story.
What did impact it, though, was whether or not my player could use the thing well. Hence, the official ruling by the people who wrote the thing was, "make something up so your players can use it."
Again, if you perceive your players as thinking their characters are or should be disposable to get chachkes, then, yeah, there's reason to keep people relatively even... presuming they already are. There are other reasons to do so, as well. But that's not the only correct conclusion.
Anyhoo, it's a valid take... but it's definitely not the "right" one - something I had to learn the hard way more than once.
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I'd be happy to have a drink to make people happy. I know the alcohol content of stuff, so I shouldn't screw myself over.Which if you want to, that's great.
But for those of us who don't (and even worse, those of us who CAN'T), this is a constant battle with the "perceived social norm" of our culture that has us banging our heads on the walls.
And that's what it comes down to. All we want is the ability to say No to something we don't want to do. Society refuses to give it to you unless you are:
A. The ONE person in your group who is going to be driving a vehicle for the rest of the group
or
B. Someone who has had such a severe problem drinking in the past that you must never do so again to avoid relapsing into addiction.
Anything else is not considered a good enough excuse.
What's worse, being recovering alcoholic is occasionally not accepted as a valid excuse in Poland.
Other issues with (not) drinking in Poland: there is a common adage of "only snitches don't drink" (Poland was occupied by foreign powers for over a hundred years, developing a wide network of conspirators and revolutionists), followed by short period of independence, followed by WWII with the most developed resistance in the world... Only to come under Soviet influence with its widespread oppression and surveillance. Let's say that distrust of authorities is rather strong, and cooperating with law enforcement is viewed with very mixed opinions, although it's getting better) - not drinking means you have something to hide, and a strong hint of narcissism with "you won't drink with ME?!" which is based on inability to comprehend that some folks don't want to drink, thus if you don't want to drink with someone it's because you have something against that person.
Ugh. Yeah. I'd forgotten that.
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I have never experienced that level of pressure to drink, but very much so when it comes to food. I have deeply offended many people and even had some stop speaking to me because I refused to eat their food because of my severe allergies. It amazes me the number of people who take it as a deeply personal rejection if you don’t eat the food they’re offering. Like, no, I’m sure it’s lovely and all, but I’m equally sure it’s not worth dying for, so no thanks....And that is literally not considered a good enough excuse o.O
... oh, for goodness sake. >.<
Though being dry in the Danish party-culture (both youth and private) isn't an easy experience, with copious amount of alcohol consumption being pretty standart with every get-together, with the possible exception of (young) children's birthdays.Getting into drunken brawls at Chuck E. Cheese's is an American tradition.
... wat.
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Kjeldorn - I would say essentially I'd like to be all fluffy, sunshine and rainbows. Maybe I've gotten soft.
Maybe I need a good stint of Witcher or something like that.
And NH, you have magical powers!
Its called Friendship is magic!
But I thought Friendship is Dragons!
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Anxiety is like when video game combat music is playing but you can't find any enemies.
Anyone have suggestions for a good layman's website-builder? I'm now pretty much in charge of my local Party's website, and currently it is hosted on Wordpress. Which I've used in the past for blogging, but the site-building side of it seems much more involved. Like I'm currently trying to figure out why our Dem Donkey header image is getting cut off on all non-home pages, and apparently I have to trawl thru the theme CSS and try to locate the individual line responsible for this inconsistency. Or find another theme that doesn't cut the header off.
Is there something more user-friendly, or is Wordpress pretty much as good as it gets?
Wix and Squarespace get advertised a lot. I'unno.
Page 3815 completed, starting page 3816.
I've 3883-3815 = 83-15 = 73-5 = 70-2 = 68 pages to go. Except that I've been keeping up since 73, so that's actually -10 pages, or only 58 pages. I'm almost halfway through!
... sort of.
Wait, no, 3871! So only 56 more pages!
... dang it.