#RPG rabbit hole…

[starsandnoodles]

Getting over my fear of posting this was CRAZY but here we go

MARX RPG

I’ve been working on this for days, made an accidental (The nova itself) and purposeful reference (the background) to Birth of a Wish by itsquakey (you should go check em out their art is SICK /pos)

- More ramblings below -

I wanted to make an RPG type thing with Marx for a while. Originally I was going to make an actually playable one but then realized I don’t have the time or knowledge to actually do that so I turned around and made it a video. Marx actually wasn’t the first idea I have for who the video would be about.

The first character I’d considered was actually Taranza but then… I’d have to draw Taranza and I was not in the mood. So I went with Marx.

The reference to Birth of a Wish (via the Nova specifically) wasn’t intended but someone I’d shown the video to pointed it out and I couldn’t leave it out in mention. The actually intended reference (the background) was specifically placed there because original all the video was going to be was some sample text and audio and then I got carried away and by that point I was over 200 images in on CapCut and unwilling to turn around.)

Where the plot was gonna go from here included the Nova having something to do with the rain in dreamland and being a small part of one of popstar’s larger moon’s or something of the sort meaning Kirby and Marx would have to find all the pieces to this “planet”. At least that’s what I imagined LMAO 😅

Note: Itsquakey if you ask me to take this down because of the references to your work I will without questions!

Last thing! I wanted to mention two posts I’ve seen that have done something similar that I think you should also check out!

Marx’s Fun Shop: while working on this I found that video and thought “wow! We even used the same music! That’s super freaking awesome!” The art here is amazing, the way Marx is written is also cool! You should go check this out!!!

Magolor’s Item Shop: A series of images in an RPG style that feature Magolor specifically! These are really cool and also what kinda struck the idea! They’re definitely worth checking out!

[firstservepercentage]

tennis star trek AU cont.

doodles during watching today's (technically yesterday's) matches. still star trek AU, but their fun Starfleet academy days.

iga, being the only engineering major cadet, single handedly carrying their engineering groupwork. the rest of them are NOT helping

2. coco and holger playing (actual) 4D chess for their tactics test

3. xenobiology lab work time for lena & mirra & lorenzo! (if i trigger any bio people who need to spend 12hrs in labs each day i am very sorry)

no ben because hes not in any of these courses. sorry ben!

also my tennis au startrek thing:

[mythveilchronicles]

[CLASSIFIED FILE: INCIDENT REPORT 1D] DISCLAIMER: This document is a fictional transcript, part of an interactive horror-narrative experience. All names, references, and institutions are fictitious or distorted beyond recognition.

LOCATION: Internal Interview Room Gamma-3, Observation Subnet Active SUBJECT: Agent [REDACTED] INTERVIEWER: Delta Green Division – VELUM DATE: October 25th TIME: 03:19 AM

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

VELUM: Last time you spoke of memory as a battleground. This time, I want specifics. Where were you when it happened?

AGENT: (pauses) I don’t know. That’s the point.

VELUM: Then explain what you mean by "the event."

AGENT: You ever walk into a room... and freeze? Like you were about to do something, but now it’s gone? Like the universe hiccupped and dropped your thought behind a locked door?

VELUM: Yes. That’s common.

AGENT: (leans forward) No. That’s deliberate.

VELUM: You’re suggesting... intentional memory erasure?

AGENT: Not “suggesting.” I’m remembering trying to remember. Which means something’s still there.

VELUM: (quiet) Describe the sensation.

AGENT: Imagine holding a photo you’ve never seen. A family you don’t know. And still—your chest tightens. Your eyes water. You know them. But someone has torn their names out of the caption.

VELUM: Is this related to Carcosa?

AGENT: Carcosa is just one infection vector. It’s not about where. It’s about what you’re allowed to retain. You think you’ve never seen the King in Yellow? You have. But you called it something else. A panic attack. A dream. Static on an old VHS tape.

VELUM: So what did you forget?

AGENT: (whispers) That I screamed. And no sound came out.

VELUM: …Agent?

AGENT: They don’t erase to protect you. They erase to keep you useful. Because if you remembered what you saw... You’d stop being able to see at all. Your sanity wouldn’t break. It would evaporate. Like sugar in rain.

VELUM: And yet here you are.

AGENT: Am I?

(long silence)

VELUM: What would you tell other agents reading this?

AGENT: (a smile like rust) When you walk into a room and forget why… Check the ceiling. There might be a camera. Or worse— A mirror that wasn’t there yesterday.

END TRANSCRIPT

DISCLAIMER: This transcript is part of an immersive horror fiction experience. It is not real. You’re not being watched. Probably.

[ephemeralhatred]

[blanketorghost]

*FUCKING EXPLODES*

[daily-ynfg-worlds]

The Rabbit Hole

[yogurtbluesideas]

once again unrelated, i fell into the lancer fandom because i was trying to look up an obscure ace combat track and got the ttrpg instead, shrugged, and then watched that for a bit before finding what i wanted

here’s the track because “lancer squadron” only has so many ways to be interpreted

[sir-sillybunny]

i love skyrim. truly the video game of all time

[kinichval]

loml: im going online, let's play together?

your phone rings up, the screen brightening the dimly lit room. a curse escapes your lips as you once again forgot to turn do-not-disturb mode on since you're down again in the rabbit hole of cramming your studies for tomorrow's examination. then again, a smile creeps up on those same lips when you read the contact name. it's kinich.

pursing your lips, you contemplate whether or not to take on his offer. 1) you love playing games with your dearest boyfriend; 2) your concentration was long broken by some sort of distraction in your head; and 3) you miss kinich. however, it's clear that your to-do list still has 3 empty boxes begging to be marked done.

you: studying for exams :( we can play tomorrow

a sigh leaves your lips, your shoulders dropping down as you push yourself back to reality. you have to study, you have to pass, and most certainly you have to make sure that you won't beat yourself up for not working harder just because there's the venomous 'you could've done better.'

loml: do you wanna watch me play?

again, your screen lights up and you quickly swipe it off the desk. a smile tugs the corner of your lips, heart fluttering.

kinich loves streaming his games exclusively for you. especially on days when you can not play for whatever reason, he'd ask to video call with you and he'd share his screen so you'd feel like you're with him.

so what if the gunshot noises aren't conventional for a locked in study session? kinich playing his games—fps, sandbox, or rpg—is a common background music of yours. the two of you doing your own thing in the company of the other despite only being in a call.

you love kinich, even if sometimes you linger a tad bit longer on his shared screen than you planned.

you: yes please baby :)

[indierpgnewsletter]

Playing Rabbits in an RPG from 1976

(This continues our 2024 series, 10 Games From The First 10 Years. First published in the Indie RPG Newsletter)

It is genuinely surprising to me that in 1976, within two years of D&D coming out, someone published a game about being rabbits. It makes a little more sense when you realize that it was inspired by Watership Down and the designers were, I believe, zoologists or something similar. But having read it, the premise is the least interesting part of this game. It has so many fascinating little ideas.

Bunnies & Burrows is a game about rabbits … but these aren’t just rabbits, they fight, explore, gamble, study herbs, see the future, parley with beetles, find love, have children – and the list goes on. The end result are characters that ironically feel more human than you’d imagine.

As I play more games, I learn about games, sure, but I’m also learning a lot about myself. And a rule of thumb has slowly emerged: I want to play games that lead to interesting, surprising, unique things being said by the players. I’ve sometimes phrased it as “people want to say cool shit at the table”. I’m people.

Bunnies & Burrows starts with D&D as a jumping off point – there’s that old, familiar rolling 3d6 down the line to get your stats. But that’s more or less where the similarities end. You have rules for fighting but it’s not D&D combat – this game is often described as having “the first martial arts system” but what this means is that fighting is mostly weapon-less and involves declaring actions that flow into each other as patterns or c-c-combos. Basically, some actions set up other actions – you can’t Rip into another rabbit unless you already pulled off a Bite & Hold in the last turn. Some actions like Run aren’t possible if you’ve just done a Pin or a Rip in the previous turn and so on. I didn’t actually get to play out a fight but these rules got me grinning.

And the whole thing is like that. The study and application of herbs is meant to be a little puzzle where through trial-and-error and dice rolls, you slowly figure out what’s good for you and what isn’t. The languages and persuasion rules mean that certain characters can become envoys to other species. Because a language can mean the difference between things turning violent and a peaceful negotiation between rabbits and a mother scorpion that has accidentally wandered into their warren.

Don’t get me wrong. Most of these little pieces are eccentric and inelegant – always more convoluted than you’d like but still a major leap forward in playability because in the end, it’s a d100 roll under a target number. All the fiddliness – and there’s a lot of it – lies in the absolutely esoteric ways this game invents for calculating that target number. But I find it easy to forgive this in an old game, especially when the most interesting part of the game doesn’t lie in the mechanics but the negative space the rules seem to create.

The donut hole in the centre of this game – fruitful void? uncrowded centre? – is the question: What is rabbit society like? This is a setting question – or rather, a system of relation question – that is never asked but it must be answered. The mechanics have some opinions. For example, every player picks a profession when they make a character – Empath, Seer, Storyteller, Scout, and so on. Some of this comes from Watership Down, which can, of course, be your ready-made answer – it’s the unstated but obvious setting sourcebook for this game. But if you don’t go down that route, you’ve got a juicy problem: What do we value? What do we despise?

[blackswampotter]

Because I hate myself, I decided to explore the rabbit hole of anti-woke commentary about Kingdom Come: Deliverance II.

Spoilers and nonsense ahead.

Not surprisingly, it's mostly antisemetic conspiracy shit and people who just hate seeing gay characters.

The completely optional same-sex romance is so well done and feels so natural, but they still hate it because it's never been about "forced" diversity; they despise any diversity.

I guess a forbidden romance between two knights in the midst of a 15th century war is too cool for these losers.

The romance scene itself is touching and vulnerable and beautifully written, but the anti-woke mob claims it's cringe and bad because, again, they just hate gay people and it makes them uncomfortable.

The actual quality of the writing means nothing to them, despite their insistence to the contrary.

There's also a plotline that involves stopping the ransacking of Kuttenburg’s Jewish quarter.

This has been the subject of a lot of conspiracy shit, as you can imagine.

It's just odd that the first game was praised for its historically grounded setting, yet when the second game explores the very real history of Jewish persecution in majority Christian nations, suddenly that's manufactured woke shit.

And, don't get me started on Musa of Mali.

KCD2 features a singular black, Muslim character and I've seen people upset that Henry's first reaction to him is not to immediately attack him as a heretic.

Nevermind the context of that meeting or that Henry is, in fact, thrown off by Musa's appearance.

I think the creepiest element of all this are the people who legitimately thought KCD was some sort of pro-Christianity experience and not, you know, a historic RPG set in a time and place where most characters would be raised Christian.

The player character and his closest allies are ostensibly Christians.

And, they also murder people. Steal. Fuck wenches. Kidnap people.

It's almost like the game has a perspective on the justifications made for acts of violence and the conflicting feelings that arise from them.

Idk, go play KCD2. It's incredible.

[ladytabletop]

Lady Tabletop's Primer for Getting into Tabletop Roleplaying Game Design Philosophy

Sam Dunnewold over at the Dice Exploder podcast has posed a fun question to his discord server: where would you tell people to start if they wanted to know more about TTRPGs and design?

First and foremost, I'd tell people to start with @jdragsky's article about Systems of Relation.

With the benefit of hindsight, I can now understand that the games we played on the playground were identical in nature to the tabletop RPGs I would grow up to play and help design.

Next, check out Thomas Manuel's analysis of the Axes of Game Design over on the Indie RPG Newsletter.

So the basic exercise is trying to figure out the standard axes or spectrums on which every game can fit. The idea is for these axes to be as descriptive and objective as possible.

Thirdly (and lastly for the purposes of this blog - it's entry-level, not comprehensive), check out this reddit thread about lonely fun.

The Lonely Fun is all of the stuff you do as a part of your hobby away from the table, in any way you might engage. For D&D 5e players, this is usually building complicated and elaborate characters on the page, pouring over the books for new races and subclasses, figuring out fun new combinations, and carefully crafting characters.

Read those? Now check out BALIKBAYAN: Returning Home by @temporalhiccup

Will we be able to outrun our Masters and those who hunt us down? Can we use our magic to bring about the rebirth of the city and all Elementals? ill this be our RECKONING or our HOMECOMING? That’s what we play to find out.

Why I make these particular recommendations below the cut.

All of these recommendations are hopefully all entry-level. I tried to stay away from any essays, blogs, or articles that reference game movements you may not have heard of or that require tons of reading before you can even read my recommendations. Some do have links to other stuff, and if you're enjoying the writing, definitely go down those rabbit holes! These are a tiny, tiny portion of my "TTRPG Homework" folder where I save essays, podcasts, etc that have helped me in my own game design journey. I'm always happy to share more, just ask!

The essay on Systems of Relation put into words something I had been thinking about the more I got into indie games/design: I've been playing my whole life, and ttrpgs are just another piece of that. I think it's crucial to break out of the framework of people trying to define play and games into neat little categories. Will I ever write a game as good as the ones I played in the backyard with my siblings? Probably not, but I'd like to find out.

Now that I've told you to stop trying to categorize games, we have an article about trying to categorize games. But I do like Thomas's assessment and examples of using game design axes. I think as designers it's important to figure out the things the game is trying to do and communicate, so that we can make sure it does those things well.

Lastly, I know 5e gets a bad rap (and it's gotten it from me, too!). But the concept of lonely fun has stuck in my craw since I first saw this thread. It's why some people prefer to GM (and therefore why GM-less games might not work for some people). Not all games are going to have lonely fun, but the ones that do are still going to appeal to people! This thread was key for me in terms of considering that no game is for everyone, and it shouldn't try to be, and also helped contextualize the enjoyment I get from the occasional high-prep game.

Balikbayan as a recommendation was a no-brainer for me. I'm not going to say it's the most elegant or tight of Rae's work, but it's the one with the most heart for me. The story this game wants you to tell is so clear, and as an introduction to "Belonging Outside Belonging" as a system/concept/design philosophy. This game really sings in its character concepts and emotional play.

If you've read this far, congratulations! I've been enjoying the DE podcast (even when I don't agree with some of the takes) and the discord has been a cool (if at times intimidating) place to hang out. I've had a hell of a game design journey this year and I'm so excited to keep learning, and to see what media other folks participating in this blog carnival recommend!

To sign off: my best advice to designers, especially those starting out can be boiled down to three things:

When in doubt, simplify or make it silly

The two cakes theory is your best friend - game design is not a competition

Not everything has to be finished. Not every part of the creative process is fun. Find the balance between these two truths (you're going to have to do that every day).

Best,

LT

[clittybomb]

hi hi intro !!!!!!! 🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷🇧🇷

call me Lina or ,, kotlin , i like that name ✌️

17, born february .. cis & bissexual 💦💦

interests include:

homestuck, cosplaying, sewing (and DIY in general), beads - buttons glitter anything related to that!! i love miniatures, I'm also interested in anything morbid so if you have any cool macabre fact you're allowed to send me it in DMS or in my askbox! I try not to judge and I also don't condone. mostly... :p

games I play on my computer sometimesss: roblox, modded minecraft (you're free to invite me to play sometime), far cry 3, guitar hero ? idk which one but i play it on my ps3, along with project diva F and F 2nd ! (the miku game) ,, I'm into rhythm games and shooting games sometimes, as long as it's not multiplayer:) im scared of playing with other people, mostly because i suck at aiming. old rpgs fascinate me and i plan to play more of them.

shockingly I haven't researched much about politics but i plan to . ( i haven't yet bcs im scared of falling into a rabbit hole or just getting the wrong info ... ) and the only big true crime case that I really like is the Oklahoma city bombing! I'm still researching on him, i mostly do it only sometimes past midnight because he lowkey triggers my paranoia .. not joking. also I'm not in the tcc,,,

i also draw sometimes, but I don't know if I will post my drawings here other than my old ones. i answer almost all asks (((not the fake Palestinians tho...))) and DMS as well!!! i am very friendly

also i have some 'controversial' opinions about slurs and i am hateful sometimes. i mostly do not mean the hateful comments, so I'm sorry in advance

[ephemeralhatred]

[emgy805]

YUME NIKKI'S CONNECTIONS TO DELTARUNE (AND WHY IT COULD BE MORE RELEVANT THAN WE THOUGHT)

Hi! If you're here, you've probably got a curiosity for Deltarune and Yume Nikki. After playing through Chapter 3 and 4, I ended up realizing quite a few things I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed yet--and that's the amount of allusions and references to Yume Nikki. Of course, this is going to include spoilers for DELTARUNE Chapters 2~3, so stop reading if you don't want to be spoiled please! This is also going to be full of crazed ramblings that aren't really organized, so take my words with a grain of salt. Good? Good. Let's go.

For starters, I want to talk about the most blatant and genuine, honest-to-god canon connection to be made; The Egg Man, also known as the Smiling Man. I'm sure almost every DELTARUNE fan knows who the guy is, so I won't go too super indepth on any theoretical lore pertaining to him. The idea is that he gives the player an Egg whenever found in inherently secret, chance-based areas. This is obviously pretty goofy, right? This guy is just giving you an egg and disappearing, never to be seen again until the next chapter.

..Of course, that is, unless you know even a little bit about Yume Nikki and the plot of the game. The goal of Yume Nikki is to gather Effects, which change the player character (Madotsuki)'s appearance and sometimes give her unique abilities. You typically receive Effects from special NPCs, who give them to you upon interacting. At the end of Yume Nikki, you are then instructed to set the Effects down and wake up.

You might be wondering, 'aren't the Effects just going to be the NPCs themselves or their specific items'? It's neither. They become Eggs. You spend so much time trying to receive Effects that sometimes are harder to locate because they show up in chance-based locations. Sound familiar?

It should. Speaking of sounding familiar, what about the track that plays when you find the Man..? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEJpVwvKq1g

Pretty, right? Did you know it's actually a track Toby Fox reused from something else?

..It's actually a fansong he made for Yume Nikki, titled Waltz of Seccom Masada. For those unaware, Seccom Masada is an NPC found in Yume Nikki only able to be accessed by falling asleep in a dream.

He lives in a big, round, white spaceship; its exterior is only visible if you initiate the Spaceship Crash Cutscene.

Curiously enough, the spaceship looks like it's egg-shaped...

Of course, you can chalk this up to Toby Fox wanting to make a little nod to one of his largest inspirations, but there's more than this to look at. In fact, these connections and references might hold way more weight than you'd think.

Shifting gears, let's think about the Dark Worlds for a second. Specifically, how they're made, how they look, etc.

We do literally see Kris make one in Chapter 2, via their knife.

Instantly, the world is shrouded in Darkness. It seems that any sharp object could be used to make a Dark Fountain/Dark World, as long as a Lightner has the will to do so. ..Which might remind someone of the fact that there's a certain dream world in Yume Nikki, home to a certain very well-known Effect.

A dream world called the Dark World. Without the Lamp Effect, you can't see anything--but once the world is lit up, you can see patterns on the floor.

A Knife? In the Dark World? How queer! ..What's with those patterns of hands just to the sides of where the Knife is? Does it look familiar?

Kind of!

How much further can we go, though? How much Darker can this rabbit hole of connections get?

There's at least one more big connection that could be made, and it's regarding Chapter 3's Sword Route.

The main premise of Chapter 3 is about playing through two segments of an RPG, called The Legend of Tenna -- an obvious reference to THE LEGEND OF ZELDA. The only exception is that they aren't full length games (there's only 2 Boards/Segments) and you aren't going around and directly attacking monsters. ..unless you get curious and wander off somewhere. Maybe if you play so poorly, or so well, that you get the worst possible score--or the best possible score--and get access to secret rooms for high-ranking/low-ranking players only. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifINNsGgFyA

It's strange, right? After worming your way through the manhole, you're now into an exclusive backstage area, with a secret old version of THE LEGEND OF TENNA--seemingly the original version. The one Tenna doesn't want you to see.

In this version, Kris can obtain their SWORD, allowing them to fight and kill enemies directly without battles.

Funnily enough, if you do well (or poorly) enough, you'll even get access to a secret BOARD 3; albeit, it's the Original Version and not Tenna's remake. This seems to imply that a remake for Board 3 exists somewhere, right? It does. In the game files. By editing them, you can play Board 3 as it was likely intended by Tenna. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVL1ai-_LtI

..How about the Yume Nikki side of this, though? Are there any proper connections to be made here? Of course! Yume Nikki has the 'FC World', AKA the Famicom World. There's two accessible worlds; Famicom World A and Famicom World B. Famicom World A is by far the much easier one to access, and takes place in a house! The other is a dark dungeon. (As a side note, FC World A is clearly inspired by Mother 1's House.)

The question is, though, how is FC World A reached?

..Through a maze of static. Garbage noise. By navigating through invisible walls to a manhole.

Think of that. Static also plays an interesting role as a visual in DELTARUNE (see Spamton, Queen, Tenna) too...

..There's one more thing to bring up, though. Didn't I just specify there's 2 accessible FC Worlds, just now?

That's right.

There's a third one. The only way to reach it is through editing Yume Nikki's game files. The only way to reach FC World C.

As far as things go, these are the main connections and references I managed to pick up from DELTARUNE. There's likely more I missed, so if anyone has thought of something, comment below! I may add more to this if I think of anything else.

[moghedien]

I fell down a rabbit hole looking at the official Wheel of Time Power Rankings and I always forget how wild the notations are with its 1(+12) and ++1 system. Anyway this ask is brought to you by Rahvin is meant to be as strong in the One Power as Rand and Ishamael is? He's stronger than Demandred? That really doesn't sound right I don't remember everything from the books (for reference I saw someone who's not one of the Forsaken at the 1(+12) tier and I have no memory of who that is and I assume she must've been somewhat important) but that sounds wild. Like broadly I don't put much stock in power levels but these are like at least like official right?

But also Logain ++2, so power levels are great I guess, Logain fans stay winning whoop whoop. (for legal purposes this post script is a joke)

I'mma be sooo real with you

I never look at the power levels, I have no idea what they mean and I have no interest in looking at it

I think the part of me that hates min maxing in rpgs and whatnot sees those numbers and my brain immediately refuses to process what they mean lol

I literally just go with "x person is stronger than y person" and nod and am like "sure ok" and never think about it

Rahvin being as strong as Rand and Ishamael sounds weird tho, especially since Rahvin is one of the Forsaken without a third name.

tho now that I'm thinking about it, if I remember correctly Rand did have trouble fighting him and only beat him because Nynaeve showed up with Moghedien on a leash and distracted him. I mean it was kinda early in Rand's forsaken murdering but still he was a problem for Rand

now I wonder why he doesn't have a third name....