#i should try and get a d100

[theresattrpgforthat]

Hello!

I've always wanted to do a stealth game/campaign, but all my attempts to hack it into DnD have failed. Do you have any suggestions for a stealthy system? Not something as abstract as Knives in the Dark (tbh, I just have never been able to get into it) but something that hits the Assassin's Creed feeling of watching the target, making a plan, and then sneaking through the base taking out guards and hiding their bodies and such. Preferably on a grid map or similar, s we're terrible at theatre of the mind.

Thanks!

THEME: Stealthy Games.

Hello there, so I did some digging and I found plenty of stealth games, although none of them seem to really require a map in order to play. That being said, I don’t think that should stop you from providing maps to your players, even if they’re abstract! Some of these games might ask you to sketch out a rough map of the town or building that you’re in, which may help you provide your players with some visual references as they sneak around, trying not to get caught. When it comes to stealth, I think of three things: horror, heists, and spies.

Delta Green, by Arc Dream Publishing.

Born of the U.S. government’s 1928 raid on the degenerate coastal town of Innsmouth, Massachusetts, the covert agency known as Delta Green opposes the forces of darkness with honor but without glory. Delta Green agents fight to save humanity from unnatural horrors—often at a shattering personal cost.

Delta Green comes highly recommended as a great way to play an X-Files type rpg, mixed in with the Cthulhu mythos. It uses a d100 system and is based in the modern day, casting your characters as former members of government agencies, recruited into a super-secret bureau that investigates supernatural things - and keeps those things hidden from the common public. The stealth of this game is mostly about covering up the eldritch and unnatural, even if it means framing someone else or condemning a beloved building.

Your characters in this game have some familiar pieces to them, such as six stats with the same titles as you’ll see in games like D&D. However, you’ll also have pieces like Bonds, which represent relationships that keep your character grounded, and a Sanity system that I’m personally not crazy about (I do not recommend this game for a group that doesn’t like trite mechanization of mental health disorders), but that gives you a way to incur penalties that aren’t just physical damage.

This looks to be the closest to a traditional rpg on this list, and with all the elements to keep track of, I can see how a physical map would be helpful. However, keep in mind that there isn’t a pace or speed stat attached to these characters, so things like line of sight or distance probably won’t be super granular - if you are shooting things you may have broad range bands to determine how difficult something is, but the final decision will be a GM decision, not something necessarily determined in the rulebook. Because the setting is a modern one, I think finding visual references for locations in this game would be very very easy.

If you want a taste of the game before you put your money down, you can check out the Free Starter Rulebook!

Minutes to Midnight, by Oliver S.

Minutes to Midnight is a game powered by Blades in the Dark about a crew of spies, trying to disrupt the balance of power in a modern cold war. They will have to stand strong in the face of their vicious opposition and handle a fragile web of untrustworthy informants, devious intrigues and deadly lies.

We play to find out if our agents can thrive in the cutthroat world of espionage. While the public may never know about their impact, their actions shape the political landscape and outcome of conflict. Will the players prevent the outbreak of a global disaster and use their influence to create a better future? Will they attempt to send the opposing bloc into a turmoil and establish a lasting hegemony? Or will their actions lead the world down a path of war and nuclear destruction?

The Forged in the Dark system uses a cycle in between missions and downtime, sinking your characters into the heart of the action as they pursue clandestine missions in locations built by the group in a session 0. Since the game takes place in the real world, using maps of real cities might be a great way to keep they players visually engaged, and using a city that the group has been to or is familiar with might also make it easier for the group to visualize the kinds of buildings and streets where their spies may be sneaking, scheming, and sleuthing.

Madstones, by xiombarg.

Those who know magic exists at all are the rich and teams of breakers like yourself that go into the jartowns for the Archons. Jartowns are created by burning folk alive in a wicker man, in a ritual known only to the oldest jet-setting Archons.

A jartown is an isolated area of spacetime that was cut out of our reality. Most jartowns consist of a small amount of space (enough for a suburb or town) and a loop of several years. Jartowns become more magickal and horrific with each loop, creating madstones. 

Madstones are small things, from actual stones to human organs, infused with concentrated, distilled magic. They're secretly coveted by the wealthy.

In this tiny 24XX-based tabletop RPG, players are breakers, desperate folk from the occult underground who find a way into the jartowns, hothouses for magick, to perform errands for the ultrarich Archons.

Play as a variety of roles, from sawbones to sinner to spook, and choose to hail from one of four origins, including jartown native.

24XX games are another toolbox that you can pick up and play around with to help you get started with creating your own experiences. Your character consists of a few skills and gear packaged together in a character class. In Madstones, these classes are various specialists, trained to deal with different elements that might pop up when you go delving into eldritch pockets of reality. There is both a stealth and a combat specialist in this game, but there’s also classes for things like a getaway driver, a hacker, and an occult specialist.

24XX games also exist because of their OSR predecessors, meaning that combat is risky, and often deadly - and therefore finding other ways to solve the problem is implicitly encouraged. However, the openness of the system means that your players don’t necessarily need to resort to stealth - they might prepare an elaborate ritual, create a unique piece of technology, or just decide to run away as fast as they can. In regards to maps, I think you could probably use a typical dungeon framework: leading the characters through various rooms or sections of the pocket dimension, and throwing horrors and weird environments their way.

Night’s Black Agents, by Pelgrane Press.

The Cold War is over. Bush’s War is winding down. You were a shadowy soldier in those fights, trained to move through the secret world: deniable and deadly.

Then you got out, or you got shut out, or you got burned out. You didn’t come in from the cold. Instead, you found your own entrances into Europe’s clandestine networks of power and crime. You did a few ops, and you asked even fewer questions. Who gave you that job in Prague? Who paid for your silence in that Swiss account? You told yourself it didn’t matter. It turned out to matter a lot. Because it turned out you were working for vampires.

Vampires exist. What can they do? Who do they own? Where is safe? You don’t know those answers yet. So you’d better start asking questions. You have to trace the bloodsuckers’ operations, penetrate their networks, follow their trail, and target their weak points. Because if you don’t hunt them, they will hunt you. And they will kill you.

A combination of modern spy fiction and vampire intrigue, Night’s Black Agents uses the GUMSHOE system, which is an investigative roleplaying system that provides your characters with resources they can spend to get into secret locations, compete against vampiric agents, and pick up information to help you put together the details of a conspiracy. In Night’s Black Agents, finding clues isn’t left up to chance - you will always get information as long as you tell the GM that you’re using a relevant skill. The obstacles in this game are more likely going to involve getting in and out of sticky situations - and if your opponents are vampires, well, stealth is likely going to be a more appealing than trying to slit their throats.

GUMSHOE games don’t need grid maps either, but a rough map of the city or country is probably very helpful, and it might be fun to draw the floor plans of various buildings that your players investigate in order to help them determine what areas may be the most interesting places to search for clues.

The Breathing, by Fistful of Crits.

You reside in The Archive, an unending and depthless structure spiralling deep into the dark and misty depths, devoid of life and presided over by a being known only to you as The Archivist.

The Archive is made up of windowless rooms and halls that vary greatly in their height, size and danger. All these spaces house numerous shelves containing the collected knowledge of the world outside of The Archive; a place you have been told you must earn your access to. The price of your freedom comes from the discovery of new or forgotten knowledge that can be found in the deepest parts of the structure. 

You, and a few others, are known as The Breathing, in a place full of creatures who were once like you but ultimately failed in their bid for freedom; now known as The Breathless. 

The Breathing is just an example of a broader style of game, using a system called Breathless. Breathless games use a series of polyhedral dice that deteriorate as you use them, with different dice attached to different skills. Throughout the game you pause to “take a breath”, and re-set your skills, bringing your dice back to their threshold. However, pausing to take a breath also gives the GM a chance to introduce a new trouble or complication, creating a cycle of mission, rest, mission, rest, etc.

As a game system, Breathless is pretty light and is fairly easy to hack. But the lightness of the rules also allows for creativity and add-ons, which could include rules for movement or placement. Since the game rewards finding ways to solve problems without having to resort to direct conflict, I can see games like this encouraging characters to think carefully about when to use their resources and when to just… sneak around the problem. If you want to include maps and a grid, you could provide a blueprint of a room inside The Archive and watch the players try to navigate it using their limited resources, with designated “rest areas” that they would have to get to in order to take a Breath.

This certainly isn’t a solution in a box, but it might provide some interesting tools to help you build the experience you’re looking for.

Night Reign, by Sinister Beard Games.

Night Reign is a roleplaying game of stealth, guile, violence and devilry for a GM and one or more players, set in a quasi-Edwardian metropolis perched on an inhospitable peninsula beset by toxic black rain and ruled by a corrupt cabal of Noble Houses.

You take the role of members of The Red Right Hand, a conspiracy loyal to the recently deposed royal family, using your talents in assassination, infiltration and dark sorcery to strike out at your oppressors.

A game all about the things you do in the shadows, Night Reign uses cards to resolve conflict, rather than dice. It also uses a token system to help you overcome obstacles without having to resort to violence - loud, messy, dangerous violence. The Ruled by Night system (which has an SRD that you can download for free) is about balancing the suspicion you’ve already raised against an increasing cost to being stealthy. You spend Shadow tokens in order to be able to attempt to do something, and try to get a hand as close as possible to 21, or at least higher than whatever the GM draws. Your characters will also have powers that can be very effective, but are likely to draw a lot of attention, so using them is risky.

Because of how this game runs, things like movement and speed are not likely to be tracked. However, I don’t think mapping out a location so that the players can understand where things are or what kind of space they’re in is going to hurt the experience. The SRD describes something called City Conditions, which appear to be elements of the fiction that might result from the characters’ choices, or provide obstacles to the players. If you have a map of the city in front of you, you could draw symbols on the map to indicate what’s happening as the story progresses, and even cross out places that have been destroyed.

Heist, by Hark Forsooth Games.

HEIST: Get the Crew Together is a cooperative RPG where you and a group of suave, savvy and slick fellow crooks plan and execute capers, grabbing the fanciest loot from the world's wealthy elite.

Heist is great for fans of shows like Leverage or movies like Ocean’s 11: you’re going to steal something shiny from someone who certainly doesn’t deserve it, and you’re going to do it with style. While combat is an option, your characters will also have to deal with suspicious marks, security systems, laser grids and bank vaults. The characters are composed of special talents and personal flaws, and the GM has the task of designing something the game calls Murphy’s Gun - a major twist that will reveal itself midway through the heist.

It can be tricky to determine what to prep for a game like this, but one thing that you can for sure prep is the location. Design the building, draw the floor plan, and come up with obstacles for the different areas - there’s not really movement tracking in this game but having the layout will certainly help your players come up with ideas about how to get in, get out, and get rich.

Another thing to consider…

Mothership doesn’t have any stealth skills, but what it does have is the incentive to be sneaky. If an alien horror is moving through the ship, you’re more likely to try and stay out of it’s way - and having no stealth skills means that the players have to describe what they’re doing to stay hidden; climb into vents, squeeze yourself into cupboards, and try to wriggle into the space suit. However, this doesn’t mean that you’re not rolling - you might roll to clamber over something or to fit yourself into something, or you might roll to scope out a location to find an exit or suitable hiding place. It’s also excellent in terms of maps - plenty of adventures will provide at least a blueprint of the space station or ship that you’re exploring, which you can use to spook your players with fresh horrors.

[edward-cabrini]

Writing Advice: Maths & TTRPG's

I know this isn't the usual topic people might expect me to drop but fuck it I need to try and at least pretend to do regular posts.

Besides I've had areal urge to design yet another TTRPG system and so fuck it. Why not share some knowledge to the writing community. Listed below are some things I'm going to cover, skip to the section you have interest in:

The maths of dice & probability

World building for a TTRPG

Marrying narrative with gameplay

The Maths Of Dice & Probability

There are 3 core dice system used for TTRPG's:

D6

D20

D100

D6 systems such as the star wars roleplaying game tend to be quick and easy rules wise. Sometimes these systems will use custom dice facings but will ultimately still have a 1/6 chance of any one outcome being rolled. However, nothing prevents you from assigning the same outcome to more than facing. Let's say a good outcome is on a roll of 2 or 5, that means there's a 2/6 chance of a good outcome. Of course, another way of determining a good outcome could be to roll equal to or higher than certain value. Such as rolling 3+, in which case, the chance of a good outcome is now 2/3.

Don't get too worried about the maths, the important thing to note is that it's very straightforward to understand what a good roll will be and that the odds of a good roll can be changed.

D20 is much the same as D6 but the average roll is 10 & 11. This is important because it means we can easily set a standard for what is and isn't challenging. If a skill check should almost always be achievable, then simply request the player to roll higher than a 5. The odd's of rolling 1, 2, 3, or 4 are 1 in 5. Put more optimistically, a 4 in 5 chance to succeed.

Before we move onto D100 systems we'll briefly discuss rolling multiple dice. This is commonly called rolling with advantage or disadvantage. Let's say a player is attempting something virtually impossible. You could make them roll 3D20 (3, 20 sided dice) and only take the outcome of the lowest value rolled. Of course that would be on top of needing them to get a high roll, for example 18. Rolling 18 or higher has a chance of 3/20. With only one disadvantage dice, the odds are 9/400; but with our extra cruel disadvantage dice being added in... Those odds become 27/8000. Still more likely than winning the lottery but not really achievable.

D6 and D20 systems will let you stack as much probability for against player as you like without worry. Realistically you only ever need one extra dice for the advantage or disadvantage mechanic. The maths says hell yes and hell no, respectively, once more dice get added. You might as well say that the action can or cannot be done and not roll for it.

Lastly the D100 system, also known as the percentile system. You roll a D10 for the units and a D100 for the tens. In this manner you can get every value from 1 to 100. I'm most familiar with Dark Heresy and Rouge Trader so we'll use those rule systems to explain some things. With a D100 system a target value is determined and the dice need to meet or exceed the target value. A very straightforward pass/fail. Where the complexity comes in is the degrees of pass/fail. If you roll really high above the target you should be rewarded. If you roll really far below, simply suffer. To me this is where the D100 system shines. It's very easy to set upper lower bounds every few points over or below the target to determine how well something was achieved. A d6 system really doesn't accommodate that mechanically the numbers are too close together. It ends up all being narratively impactful rather than mechanically. D20 systems are much the same. Both systems have crit fails and successes by rolling the extremes values, e.g. Natural 20 & Natural 1. D100 systems let you have the in between stuff be mechanically significant in the system. It can really make all the difference.

You shot the heretic pretty well and manage to hit him twice with your spray and pray burst, lucky you. Or alternatively, you fumbled so badly the gun explodes in your hand and the shrapnel hit's everyone within 5m of you. Hilarious, now go become servitor.

There's not much to add with the maths, it's all very straight forward. in a D100 system, the percentage of rolling a specific value on 1d100 is 1/100. Calculating the odds of rolling more than 60 is therefore as simple as saying it's 40% chance, y'know, the remaining value between 60 and 100.

Anyway that wraps up this section. No system is better than the others they just have their own maths to bear in mind. Do not forget the maths. It's so important to the narrative feel of your TTRPG that the maths matches the vibe.

World Building For A TTRPG

This is probably where most of the writers jumped to, hello all. So how does one world build for a TTRPG? How is it different than world building for a novel? Your setting will immediately be discarded. I'm deadly serious, if, it's some variety of sword and sorcery or urban fantasy. You can be certain that a long time DM will ignore the setting in favour of the mechanics. Some systems do thrive on their setting E.g. The warhammer TTRPG's, they are an exception not the rule.

When designing a world for your TTRPG it's sole purpose is to provide a base platform that a DM can slot a test one shot into to see if their group likes the mechanics. They will then design a campaign in their own setting. People read our books to be invested in the world we craft and characters that fill it. People play TTRPG's to be a character in a world of their creation.

Yet... That's not quite the full picture is it? People play modules, narrative set pieces with a predetermined story. So clearly people can be invested in the world itself of a TTRPG. In a core rulebook, the world building takes a back seat. Front and centre should be the mechanics. The world building exists in example names, the mechanics, the player races and character equipment, how deadly the weapons are. In a core rule book the world building is brought about by degrees of information encircling the rules. When writing an adventure module, that is different. The world building is front and centre but it's shown through the places you take characters and the obstacles put in their way. Something that is often neglected is just having stuff in a place. Let's say the module starts with the players stepping onto the docks after a long voyage through fog. The DM will read aloud your description of what they immediately see. People unloading trawlers, a church, a raucous gathering by a tavern, some crates and fishing nets. All of those places can have things for players to look at and interact with that will tell them more about your world. For example a player might say they want to investigate the crates and nets. The DM should have a little sentence to read out about crates and nets. Even if it's just: "They are crates and nets made of natural fibres." That short sentence has told us that we are not in a technologically advanced area. There's no synthetic materials being used for the fishing. You could of course immediately contrast this with a magazine fed rifle being enshrined within the church. Painting a rather curious picture of the quaint fishing town.

That in a nutshell is the difference. The world building is in the small things and what you chose to give the DM as points of interaction of their players. Build it and they will try a hundred ways to interact with it... Before realising it's not hiding a secret button and moving on.

This takes us neatly to:

Marrying Narrative With Gameplay

This post is exceedingly long so I'll keep this nice and brief. If your setting is grimdark and you want your players to feel vulnerable. Then at no point should they be unafraid of a group of regular people. A gang of 10 people are a threat and they can easily stomp one person to death. If in your system a player can become immune to the attacks of 10 people then it's quickly going to feel like a power fantasy. A great example of this going wrong is my friend's D&D campaign I made a character with an ungodly high AC who would regularly interpose himself between X attack and Y target. Literally nothing could get past his AC. Known originally as Val-Müne after a siege he was known as The Wall. This is because he stood in a breach made by a catapult and just stood there. Rules as written regular people could not hit him without a critical success and equally simply could not move him. It was the only thing keeping all going during an 8hr combat session. We became like mad cultists celebrating The Wall and deriding the fools who came to die by his hand. Very fun. Not the bleak siege my friend intended. We started off with feeding people to Griffin's and ended with nearly feral celebrations and drinking at every hit that managed to get through for a single D6 or D8 of damage. The mechanics didn't match the narrative.

My advice to you, is to think about the kinds of stories you want experience and then design the mechanics to support that story.

[lillythepyromancer]

I thought i'd introduce myself, shant I?

Welcome to my blog kind stranger!

My name's Lilly, Lilliana and any other alternate spellings. You may also call me Pyro. I'm a 19 year old Software Engineering University student. I also happen to be transgender and aroace*! Im also in a commited relationship with @hxy0k! Go check out their stuff!

So uh. Whats your deal?

Im glad you ask! Im a huge nerd! (Of everything there is to gain knowledge of, I will try to know and remember It! (and fail at It but try!))...

...but I mostly like greek mythology, videogames and medieval history and architecture.

oh yeah. im also a Dungeon Master! i play Pathfinder 2e, D&D, TWDRPG, Unnoficial Hollow Knight TTRPG, Hitos (A Spanish System with no known translations that I know of) and currently I'm making my own! (based on d100s and percentiles, with so much customization its taking YEARS to make (currently its been 4 years in the making)). Other TTRPGs I want to play but I haven't yet (because getting groups together to play is management hell) include Vampire The Masquerade, Cyberpunk and LANCER!

What about talking to you?

Do it!!!!! I have heavy social anxiety and talking to people is incredibly hard. I am 100% approachable and as friendly as I can. I am just anxious constantly and making the first move is hard on my psyche.

Asks are open, DM's too.

I love talking. a lot. about anything and everything. i also listen a lot (even if im not good at conversation).

What videogames you play?

All I can get my hands on. But since you are asking so nicely...

My favorite genres of games to play are; RPGs (with amongst my favorites being the Owlcat Pathfinder games, Fallout: New Vegas, Baldur's Gate 3, Disco Elysium, Dragon's Dogma 1/DA, Cyberpunk 2077 and KOTOR 2 (I didn't play 1 when i played the second I should replay both on Steam now)), Shooters (WILDLY varied taste tho, but I really like Halo (Reach, my beloved), the whole Metro Franchise (SO ATMOSPHERIC SO COOL), Ultrakill, Helldivers 2), Stealth games (with a love for the Dishonored franchise and Metal Gear, but one of my recent likes is Mark of the Ninja!), VR games (this isn't even a genre, but I LOVE Blade and Sorcery and the The Walking Dead VR games. My favorite VR Game is Blade and Sorcery, hands down), any Game made by Valve (seriously Portal and Left 4 Dead are two of my favorite games) and arcade games! (This including ANYTHING really. I love Beat Em Ups, side-scrollers, platformers... I've spent hours playing weird obscure games using emulation tools that would be lost to time otherwise. But my favorites? Both Dungeons & Dragons SOM//TOD and Cadillacs & Dinosaurs. Honorary mention to Knights of the Round (Did you notice I like beat em ups?))

...i also have others I couldnt fit here. Im not a fighting game girlie (because im really bad at them) but I really like Soulcalibur, Street Fighter III and Guilty Gear!

Im also not a horror game aficionada but SIGNALIS has been A WORLD SHATTERING EVENT in my gaming career. BRAIN TWEAKING EXPERIENCE. Chemistry completely changed forever. Please play It. Right now. Its imperative you do, for your sake.

I also really like the first Dark Souls! I would love to say more but- I can't. Its been years and I've only played the first one. Bloodborne fucks severely tho and I will defend It forever GOSH how i love em both even if the second half of the first DS, SUCKS, SEVERELY. (Im the only person i know that hates having to run through the Duke's Archives so much i put off New Game + cycles forever to NOT go kill scaleless' ass)

I really like Indie games but since every single one I like is basically a different genre here you got a speedrun (and recomendation list!);

Celeste (my favorite Game ever, helped so much with anxiety at the time, played It when i didn't know I was transgender... That fact gets funnier with replay), Deadlight (play It once and thats it. Zombie parkour puzzle Game.), Slay the Princess (the multiple voices thing is oddly relatable), Project Zomboid (100% the BEST BEST zombie survival Game ever, love It), Webfishing, Darkest Dungeon (MY BELOVED the sequel), Noita (i like torture), Hollow Knight (even tho im not really into metroidvanias, Hollow Knight IS really fun), Terraria (player since 1.1!), Charlie Murder (not that well known and they deserve It!!), Broforce (It is. So fun), every Game made by The Behemot, Lethal Company, Phasmophobia, Rain World, Undertale and Deltarune (of course) and lastly, Inscryption (another Game that is so so good, please play It)

And well, not an Indie but... I play Minecraft. So much

WOW. Thats was a LOT of text. Anything you do on the side outside of playing games?

I write! Both for my TTRPG campaigns I DM but also stuff on the side!

Nothing's public tho, my cringy fanfiction Will stay with me to my grave. However, I am writing original material right now! A Magical Girls story which any kind of synopsis would blow up the initial mystery. I **may** share snippets of It some day. If my anxiety allows me.

I also do YouTube videos. They aren't very good but I like em. Please check It out. And leave comments! They do make my day.

And... Im also a musician! I play the piano, I'm a drummer and I sing in a choir. I'm composing some stuff on the side as well but I dont have time nor resources to record and compose as comfortably as I'd like. Maybe if I end Up being able to get something I'll post It!

And i draw. Im not good at It, but I draw! This blog should have SOME examples of OC's i draw. Some of em are NPCs in my campaigns, others are player characters, other are just characters. I love em all the same.

Anything else?

I know the Standard Galactic Alphabet. I think its neat. My favorite movie is The Princess Bride. My favorite song is... im not sure I have too many. I have two Blåhaj.

I think you are good to go! Venture into my blog as you wish!

Oh, well. I am also probably autistic. There are no doubts in my all autistic friend group about it.

*im on the aroace spectrum, demisexual and demiromantic to be precise.

[grigori77]

Critical Role, Campaign 3 Episode 97

Are they ... are they NOT doing a sponsorship plug this time? Just straight to the announcements? Interesting ... not complaining, mind ... more time for GAME, after all ...

Well then, so it's just STRIGHT INTO THE GAME, then ... okay then ... maybe that's a GOOD sign ... O.O

Yeah, that was A LOT of failed teleportations ...

Stright into an Initiative Roll ... wonderful ... cue Wizzkids plug!

An Essek sandwich? I wouldn't say no ... XD

Ashton's going to RAGE ... he charges in and just immediately starts swinging! Yeah, I should imagine 30 would hit ... and now he's been sprayed with acid blood! Of course he has ... and now it's STUCK TO HIS HAMMER!!! Fuck ... so he tries to BEAT IT OFF ... splat! Oh yeah, that just DESTROYED IT.

Great, they're swarming already ... might not have been the smartest move to just run staright into 'em, Ashton ... now they're going fot Laudna ... holy shit, Matt is rolling BALLS right now, ALL THREE attacks fail to gain purchase on her! XD But a couple of them do manage to bite Ashton ... eurgh ...

Fearne casts Flaming Sphere on the big thing! She torches the fucker ... but she's doing it at a higher level so it may be about to get weird ... oh boy ...oof ... roll a D20 then, Ashley ... 14? Phew ... she's safe ... bloody Wild Magic ... then she hides out again ...

Orym uses his fancy boots to jump over Chetney and rush in behind the monster ... Goading Attack! Yeah, Wee Man ... Matt fails his Wisdom save ... whoa ... did Liam REALLY just roll a Nat1 he COULDN'T reroll? Holy shit ... very first time for this Campaign ... oh well ... Tripping Attack! Wait ... this thing can REGENERATE? Boooo! Then he disengages and it gets an aAttack of Opportunity ... and HITS HIM!!! Crap! Thankfully he manages to clear his Strength Save so it doesn't smash him on the spot ... thank the gods for that shield ...

Essek glides into the fray and starts weaving a spell ... a Gravity Fissure? Holy fuck, Hot Boi! Okay, so ... that's doing good, but also thoroughly perilous for the group too! Maybe this wasn't the SMARTEST move right now ... don't suck everybody into a bloody mini Black Hole!

So it's the Monster's turn ... here comes the ridiculously huge hammer ... oh shit, CENTRE MAW!!! It bites at Orym ... crap! 24 points of Piercing damage ... and now it's FUCKING CHEWING HIM!!! Meanwhile it makes a swing for Dorian ... fuck, that just batteres Dorian hard enough he gets knocked CLEAN THROUGH the nearby building ... ouch ...

Dorian picks himself up and sets off his Winged Boots, then flies over to the Monster, then casts a 5TH lEVEL LIGHTNING BOLT!!! Holy shit ... Imogen, meanwhile, coordinates with him and does the exact same thing! Cool ... Matt fails both saves! Sweet! 10 D5 Lightning damage from EACH OF THEM!!! 40 from Dorian, 42 from Imogen! Holy fuck! CRACKADOOM!!! Thor's in the House!

Oh crap ... what did Imogen do? Laura has to roll a D100 ... Wild Magic strikes again ... 4? a Fireball explodes RIGHT ON TOP of Imogen? Holy shit ... Laudna manages to make her save, at least ... Laura: "At least I'm not a sheep." Yeah ...

Chetney unleashes Turmoil and casts Shatter against the Monster ... 20 Thundr dmage halved right up its butt ... then he starts to circle round as cautious as he can for a better vantage point ...

Laudna decides to try something NEW, unleashing Void Puppet on it ... that is some FREAKY SHIT right there, Dead Girl! Oh yeah, that spirit effect is just HORRIFYING ... now she dumps a Fireball on as many of the crawlies as she can ... BOOM!!! Using a Sorcery point to Empower, she lands 38 points of Fire damage on each of them and annihilates THREE of the fuckers ... and now the tent's on fire ..

Ashton triggers a Hyper-Rage and charges the Monster, leaving WEIRD streaks and after images behind him ... while Taliesin elbows Liam in his funny-bone, Ashton inflicts 25 points of Gravitational damage on it and shoves it hard backwards ... then he leaps on top of it to swing his hammer HARD down to land another SMASHING hit ... BOOM!!!

Fearne pops out Mister and chucks him close to Laudna, then throws a Scorching Ray at 3rd Level at the Monster ... one miss THREE hits! Sweet! 17 points of Fire damage, plus 7 more thanks to Mister ... and it does NOTHING to the creature? Shit! It's immune to fire? NOOOOOOOO!!!

Orym takes another 19 points of piercing damage from the maw ... then pulls a Misty Step to pop OUT of its mouth and run up its arm, then goes swinging ... he proper carves it up, doing some genuine damage ... it's like carving through dead meat? Yuck ... one last hit and he gets the HDYWTDT!!! Yes! Down it goes!

Oh ... so there's SOMETHING moving off in the distance somewhere ... is it a potential threat? Hmmmm ...

Yeah, might be best to put the tent-fire out ...

Motivational Speech? Nice one, Dorian! 4th Level ... that's 10 temp hit points to five of them and temp advantage on saves ... cool ...

GO FOR THE TOWER!!! FAST!!!

Not particularly safe, then ... but it's a hiding place, at least ...

Weird fur-less oversized wolves ... charming ... with eyeballs on the end of theit overlong tails? Freaky ...

Crap ... something else is coming from another direction? Great ...

Oh yeah, a Short Rest might be a good idea ...

Weird gorilla-like things? Also creepy ...

There's something horrible on the ceiling grabbing things? Oh my FUCKING GODS that is nightmare fuel ... O.O

Pass Without a Trace ... group Stealth check with advantage ...

Oh yeah, the gigantic sinkhole ... flying would likely be helpful to avoid THAT shit ... oh yeah! Dorian could TOTALLY carry Orym, that would be IMMENSELY helpful. Also it'll be REALLY fun for the shippers too ... XD

So this was a hole from something being blasted up and out, then ... lovely ... oh, they're going down INTO IT ... great ... O.O

The smell of ASSSSSSSS ... LOL

Tingly, creepy, oppressive ... just WRONG, basically. This place is NOT a good place to be ...

The Occultus Thalamus ... yeah ...

That is ... A LONG FUCKING WAY DOWN ... O.O

Awwww ... remembering FCG ... please don't, I'm not strong enough ...

Touchdown, then ... yeah, this place is a mess ... but it's also CLEARLY been disturbed ... another leftover Vanguard camp, it seems ... and something weird ... breathing in the dark distance ... oh, that's just PEACHY ...

Is that blood? Hmmmm ... sniff check for Chet ... not fresh, then ... it's a smear from something being dragged off into the dark ... charming ... that's not, like, FOREBODING at all ...

Hello Pate ... immediately he's admonished for being SO LOUD ... yeah, he doesn't really HAVE an "inside voice" ... oh yeah, he can talk in her head instead, that's better ... time for scouting, then ...

And Matt calls it a break ... okay then ...

Yeah ... this place really does give us the collective creeps ... oh ... an open door? Hmmmm ... this is where the blood trail is leading, too ... lovely ...

Some kind of storage chamber ...

Big glass containers? Hmmmm ...

Dorian's gettign awful far ahead ... maybe that's not, like, SUPER smart ...

Ah, so this is about to become virgin ground for Essek? Great ... and his knowledge has some holes, too ... hmmmmm ...

Remembering Caleb ... yeah, he's a hell of a guy ... :3

Insight Check? Really, Ashley? Oh, WHISPERS!!! Intriguing ...

Oh, so clearly somebody's been through here since and opened it up ... yeah, looks like this is the way, then ...

Chetney checks for traps ... nothing of note ...

Aha ... children's hospital colour theory ... thanks for that, Tal ...

Yeah, looks like this might be the smarter place to check for traps ... is that stone fixed? Movable? Should we be suspicious?

The wooden chair ... yeah ... LOL

Push the stone ... the door's open ... nothing happens ... and they''re all still obssessing about the stone ... this bunch, they're so paranoid ... I love it ... XD

Liam: "Any velociraptors hiding out in here?" Matt: "What are you looking for? Velociraptors?" LOL

Boiling tar? Oh lovely ... best avoid THAT shit ...

Oh, so the stone's an arcane lock ... okay then ...

Carrying on, then ... it's opening up ahead ... and there's that smell again ... metallic ... somewhere up ahead ... loads and lods of ancient corpses littering the floor ... and lots of dangling chains hung from the ceiling ... with more bodies hanging from several ... great ... O.O

The hanging bodies are FRESH ... great ... Vanguard, looks like ... seemingly suffering a similar fate to the last batch upstairs ... great ...

Yeah, it would probably be4 too much wishful thiniing for one of THESE poor buggers to be Ludinus, wouldn't it ...

Oh, like this could be a TRAP, then? Rogue Aeorian tech? Hmmmm ...

Wait ... WHAT THE FUCK?!!! Pate is just suddenly GONE. Shit!

Form of Dread! Yeah! Mama's ANGRY!!!

Hunter's Bane ... Chetney sniffs for undead ... something here is FIENDISH ... great ...

Religious or Arcana check ... 16 Arcana ... the chains seems to have been conjured THROUGH the stone? Oh that's just GREAT ...

Spiderclimb ... smart ...

Oooh ... Essek has more fancy tricks up his sleeve ...

Ah, I see ... so question a corpse, then? Hmmm ...

Here we go, then ... Speak With the Dead ... cool ...

"The whispers in our head"? Oh, that's just ... AWESOME ...

"This started with the engine room"? Oh, that's interesting ... is that some kind of clue? Something about that rings a bell ...

Oh, Fearne's summoning her demon bae Tevan ... trying to be as discreet as she cane about it for Dorian's sake ... yeah, that don't work too well soon as the massive intimidating infernal smoking hot BADASS appears ... "The pact begins." Yeah ... great ...

Crap ... HE KNOWS Dominox ... great ... a "great enemy" from ancient times? Awesome ...

Laudna: "Do you have any bros you can call on? Now might be the time." Tevan: "... there is a bit doing on."

Essek is clearly more than a little flabbergasted by this whole business. XD

Orym (observing all of this going on around him): "Metal ..."

Whoa ... is Chetney POSSESSED?!!! Is Dominox getting into his head? "The bad wolf"? What? What the blue FUCK is this creepy Stephen King freakiness?

He can't see his friends anymore ... oh, that's not good ...

Oh sweet fuck ... Chetney, WHAT DID YOU DO?!!!

THIRTEEN? Fuck ...

Laudna can't get through to him ... not good ...

Orym touches Chetney's shoulder and HE FEELS a blade stabbing into it ... fuck ... hew responds very much IN KIND ... and claws into Orym ... SHIT!!!

Oh fuck! He snapped out of it! How ... how the hell did he do that? WAS IT real? Is it this place or did that GENUINELY just shake some buried memory loose in him? I don't like it at all ... this is all SO BAD ...

Shit ... yeah that is a GOOD FUCKING POINT, Ahston going off like that would be a REALLY BAD THING ...

Tevan is not much help right now, clearly ...

Dorian: "And we have the power of friendship! Which is why we'll WIN!!!" Bardic Inspiration! Yeah, fix that shit for 'em, Dorian!

Grim Psychometry? REALLY?!!! Right now? In THIS hellhole?

The hooks are simply facilitation, they're not the agents here ... interesting ... pure abyssal energy? Oof ... it's TOO MUCH to even interpret, clearly ...

Dorian's investigating ... oh, that's interesting ... the chains are just LYING there on the ground, pregnant with possibility, like they're WAITING ...

Trying Speak With the Dead again ... one of the "crazies" this time ...

"The Pinion of Service"? That's how Dominox was captured. An abyssal soul anchor ... shackled to THE ENGINE? Oh WOW ... that's interesting ... and now we know WHERE THE ENGINE IS. Cool. If the seals are intact Dominox is dormant ... well that's surely a big giveaway, then ...

Dominolx "feeds on insecurity" ... Imogen: "Oh gods ..." NO SHIT!!! O.O

DORIAN has to throw a Wisdom save? OH FUCK NO!!! Not now! 16? Hmmm ... is that GOOD?

He sees his brother Cyrus in one of the hanging corpses ... and it starts talking to him ... AND THIS is where Matt calls it for the night! SHIT!!!

Fuck ... once again, the very worst kind of cliffhanger ... O.O

Oh wow ... so THIS is where they're gonna pick it up on the Live Special? That is SO COOL ...

[keeper-not-hero]

Bizarro (or maybe not-so-bizarro) idea: Horde-based TTRPG because I wanna play as the Director:tm:. Enemies are represented by dice (or aything that can track numbers), players are cool player models.

A basic enemy group is represented by a d6+3, a larger group by a d10+5, and a horde by a d100+50. There can (and should be!) multiple of the first two groups, with the Horde being saved for climaxes or finales.

There are also stronger enemies, Disruptors, your Smoker / Witch / Hunter etc type of enemies who *also* get cool models.

I'm torn between players having classes and it being up to items to customize you, because I *do* like leveling up in-games... but as a very rough prototype, no classes, just weapon types and auxiliary items.

Weapons have massive dice (like, a basic pistol being a 1d12) BUT they also, more importantly, have a "base" damage number (oh no, the Pistol's base number is 3! that's so weak!) to represent spraying and praying.

Broad strokes, not finished / put too much thought into: Melees deal damage per-"group"/enemy dice, making them great chaff-clearing weapons but overwhelmed by hordes. Sniper weapons that are great at picking out targets by having massive base damage but can't deal base damage to chaff (so if I shot a sniper into a horde, even if it's total damage is 1d6+40, anything above the 1d10 would go down the drain, to represent what few collat kills you could get). Auto-rifles and burst weapons that deal great dice damage but low base damage (to make them great at horde-clearing but weaker at murdering Disruptors due to RNG), explosives having a radius, etc

Played on a Candyland / Monopoly-esque tile-based board, making a map with a "start" and "exit" that players must reach. Just like in L4D, they start with only tier-0 / tier-1 weapons and must scavenge their way into better gear, with stuff like medkits, explosives, etc also being spread around the map as decided by the GM. The maps have at minimum two "crescendo" events, AKA horde-spawners. Depending on how damage ends up being balanced, it could be one or multiple horde dice to accomodate the usual 4 player party. Crescendos will be explained shortly.

Players have 3 actions + movement a turn, the broadth of 'em all being added later 'cuz I'm not writing a rulebook I'm writing a concept. Each square takes around 3 full movements from all players to cross onto the next one.

These crescendos range from the usual L4D rush to somewhere / hold out X turns to stuff like a proper puzzle, maybe having to backtrack to find a missing key or turn on a generator, having to pick out a specific pod around the map for the keycards / explosives etc.

At the safe house, it can be the end of the game as a one-shot or one out of multiple sessions, with the meta progression occurring through player skills with weapons, activities, and possibly unlocking perks.

For role-playing purposes it might be interesting to dip into Darkest Dungeon 2 and add a relationship mechanic where friendly fire, having to do stuff alone, or a stress-esque mechanic cause conflict or a bond through players, that also mechanically helps them, encouraging group play to buff yourself and others

The DM of course controls the hordes, the pods, the placement of weapons, and can adjust things on the fly juts like the actual game director would. If the players are doing too well, throw an unexpected horde or Boss enemy at 'em. If the players are roughed up, throw some healing.

Could even have NPC survivors as a mechanic and an explanation to how other PCs show up, as well as having ranged "bosses" to take down. Stealth gameplay would also be an interesting idea to try and implement, because I think a lot of people would get a kick of sneaking past a gigantic horde, one bad roll away from being turned into meat.

[prima-materia-ttrpg]

Shooting for gold and falling flat on your face or How I failed miserably at writing ranged combat.

Not every mechanic is a winner, and designing a ttrpg is hard. First drafts, playtesting, modification, second draft, playtesting, modification. So far all of the systems I've written, while they absolutely needed extensive work, had solid cores. Sometimes, though, like when I wrote Ranged Combat last week, the base it's built upon is faulty and the whole thing needs to be gutted and scrapped for anything salvageable.

After playtesting and modifying melee combat, its core seemed solid and I decided to move on to ranged combat. One of the core principles involves not missing, or missing being rare. This is why when someone comes at you with a melee weapon, you can dodge or block to mitigate some or all of the damage. Armor, while not yet written, will also play an important roll in damage mitigation.

Ranged combat as I wrote it does allow missing, but missing is rare (or so I thought) particularly at close ranges. It didn't make sense to me to be able to dodge projectiles or block them with a weapon, and I haven't written a cover system or put in shields which would be able to block projectiles, so the only real thing that mitigates getting hit by a ranged weapon is armor. This was a mistake.

Before we get into all of that though, let me get into the core of how I wrote the mechanic and how that was bad. I decided that because ranged damage was hard to mitigate, it should have a chance to miss, which means an attack roll to see if you hit. For some reason, I decided that the player should roll a d100 so the Hit Chance (the number you try to roll at or under when rolling the d100) would align with a percentage. In theory, this works, especially since I tied it to the Dexterity attribute on the character sheet. In practice, the very first playtest I ran with these mechanics saw characters with long guns and an 80% chance to hit miss most of the time, and a single Xente character (large amoeba thing - it will get its own species highlight later) nailed two player characters one after the other on one turn with a roughly 18% chance to hit with its revolver due to the distance. My players have dubbed this particular Xente Big Boss after the metal gear character, and it will be making a re-appearance.

The clear issue here, of course, is that rolling a d100 gives you as much a chance to roll a 1 as it does a 100, and even if you play with percentages like I did, weird stuff is going to happen at some point. Perhaps even often within the span of a session. There were other issues with this ranged system as well, one of my players said it felt like it came from a completely different game compared to how melee combat feels. Another player astutely pointed out that a class of weapons that can one-tap most characters with little effort and no real choice for the player to be able to get out of the way or otherwise mechanically try to save themselves, feels bad.

I got some good feedback, and I'm still trying to figure out how to move forward with the ranged mechanics. I have some ideas that will bring it more in-line with melee mechanics but I have to see how it hashes out, and then playtest that. All-in-all, this is a good experience. Not every mechanic is a winner, but failure is incredibly important.

If you read all this, thanks! I appreciate it very much. I'm trying to figure out what to do for the next blog post, it's a toss-up between another species highlight (humans - I promise it will be interesting) or how alchemy (magic) works in detail. This would be the history of alchemy as a field of study, animals that have evolved to use it, and what players will be able to do with it.

[soundwave-starlight]

So I've played dnd for a decent amount of time. And I do genuinely enjoy 5e, but I've started to get into other systems and have started realizing that dnd doesn't quite do the art of ttrpg quite as good as others.

(Note: I will get very incomprehensible with this post. I'm sorry)

Now this could totally be because of the type of player I am. I much prefer to engage in the roleplay aspect of these games because combat kinda bores me. Dnd puts like 60% of its focus onto combat, and even outside of that it overcontrols dice rolling.

Dnd is a game that at its core focuses heavily on your modifiers, they determine how you interact with the world and what you are capable of. The problem is that so much emphasis is put on this and the thing you are rolling around is at the complete whim of the GM, so it doesn't feel consistent. It doesn't always feel like it matters that I should in story be really good at this if I roll really badly or my GM decides it was to hard for me to do. This can be fine for a lot of things (combat mainly) but for outside of combat and doing things that will progress the plot it just feels like I am not enough in control of my characters success. Yes I understand that sometimes people fail even when they are really good at something but I want more certainty in the skills I'm supposed to be good at.

For example, take Call of Cthulhu. CoC has a stat based system where you are trying to roll a d100 under your own skill stat to determine success. It feels much more like your character has their skills and you're actually good at things, as opposed to a +5 which supposedly means your good but if you get a 2 on the dice you still rolled a fucking 7 loser.

Or take Wildsea, a system I am trying to get into more that tells you out of the gate whether or not you will succeed based on exactly what you roll. It doesn't even really have stat numbers its great!

It just feels like those games let you focus more on the roleplay and the story aspect without having to worry too much about if my numbers are good enough to do the things I want to do. Dnd spends so much time telling you about how its numbers work and directing all of your time to them its no wonder some players don't even think about roleplaying.

I guess what I'm trying to say is dnd feels almost too gamey. It feels too focused on the function and not focused enough on the character and the roleplay aspect.

And dnd doesn't even offer that much customization across characters! The amount of times I've stopped myself from making a character because they are too close to a character from a podcast is insane! Which is odd because in truth these characters are very different they only have a shared race and class! They have completely different personalities and stories but I can't get myself to make them because I don't feel like I can distinguish them enough!

I think that dnd might just not be the game for me. I'm gonna keep playing it because its fun and a good way to spend time with friends also it is the most well known system I just think it's not even close to the best one.

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

wheezes i made. a game! a functioning playable game that i've had a lot of fun playtesting so far! sat down and made the core rules in one session yesterday, wrote up another few chunks for guiding/prompting the roleplay part this morning. and i have a bunch of variants drafting and those are definitely still in the works lmao, but the rules as they are are 100% playable and i am extremely proud of having gotten them down this fast.

there is definitely going to be further drafting etc, and i'm hoping to be able to format it with an actual graphical layout at some point. and also make like an actual proper intro post for it instead of just dropping it hot on my blog for whoever happens to be following me. in the meantime though here you go, if anyone decides to try it out have fun and i'd love to hear how that goes. enjoy!

[cws: horror, mentions of death, gore, and injury, possible themes of stalking. it's a game where you're being hunted down and have to prepare for what happens when you can't run anymore, so it has the potential to get real dark depending on how you play it lmao]

-

Core Rules

-

-

Guiding the Fiction

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(this section is probably a lot less coherent and has more repetition going on than i'd like, definitely is going to need a redraft or two, but i think it gets the mechanics across in a usable way as-is. meant to get further into the last set of examples, but i had to catch myself before i got carried away and ended up just filling out a d100 table. that'd be fun to do at some point but not by dropping it in the middle of the rulebook lmao)

-

and that's the game so far! if anyone reads these and finds any specific bits to be confusing, please feel free to ask questions; i want to do my best to make sure my games fit together and are as clear as possible, with or without graphical gamebook format for visual aid, so fresh eyes are always welcome. in the meantime thank you for your time, and should you check it out may you have fun being chased by a Funny Little Guy

[real-mr-meat]

ARRAKIS AWAKENING: HOW THE SYSTEM WORKS

I should have done this one first shouldn't I. Also I lied. No spreadsheets for you. Perhaps this is now every other day.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Arrakis Awakening is a d100 system so get the percentage die warmed up.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rolling:

In Arrakis Awakening the base maximum amount that a player can roll is x1.25 their DC for a roll. So if you have a 16 in Gain you can, at a maximum get a 20. If you roll over that it gets set down to the maximum.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

DC:

DC for a check calculated by whatever the persons stats are for the effected stats so if character a has a 20 in notice you would need to roll at least a 20 in order to successfully lie to them.

Your stats function like hit modifiers. So if the same character had a 5 in lie they would only need a 15 in order to successfully lie.

If you roll less than half of the DC for a roll no matter what your modifier is you will critically fail the roll. Items have a critical fail state noted in the item stats. A critical fail in a social interaction will lower your reputation with the faction they are apart of by the DC minus the roll.

Reputation adds or subtracts DC based on your reputation with the faction the character is apart of. So if you have -20 reputation with the faction the character your trying to lie to the DC would go from 20 to 40 because it's adding -20 to the roll

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Knowledge:

Knowledge is a seperate perk system that you can gain outside of level ups and can individually level up.

During downtime players can seek out people who can teach them certain skills or minor skills. They can also buy tutor consoles in order to learn. Players can also teach other players knowledges or improve their minor skills.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Perks:

Perks are little treats you get as you level up. You know how this works

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Courage:

Courage is a secondary health system. If you get to zero or lower courage you start getting levels of fear. You get one point of fear for every negative point in courage. Fear subtracts one point from all your minor skills expect for courage and B resist and for every one point in fear. You also gain 1 point in power and B resist for one point in fear. If you have 7 or more minor skills set at or below zero because of this then your character dies of a heart attack.

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Health:

Standard health system. Everyone has 100 health

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Items:

You don't know the exact stats of an item type unless you use it, buy it from a shop, find a manual on it, or gain knowledge on it.

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I think that's it.

[swordshapedleaves]

Tuesday Indie Game Tabletop Sampler Weekly noon to 4 PDT

I donated to a couple charity bundles on itch.io last year and now I find myself the owner of several hundred games. I'd love to run/facilitate a series of one shots and short campaigns (up to ten sessions but preferably under 8) going through this collection. There's also a few games that seem to be very foundational for other games that I'd like to try out like Apocalypse World, Blades in the Dark, and Monster of the Week. These games would happen in my private discord server, which we would use for voice chat during games. We'd use roll 20 for our VTT needs, and google docs and sheets for shared documents we all need to edit.

Your Game Organizer: Hi, I'm MercifulWombat (37they/he)! I've been playing TTRPGs over 20 years, mostly d&d but there's been a ton of other games along the way. I don't mind crunch but I'm not a fan of d100 systems. I'm here to tell a cool story and I just find that level of granularity to be more trouble than its worth. My GM style is mostly a Miss Frizzle vibe. I'm here to take you on a wild ride and help your characters grow so I hope you feel empowered to "take chances, make mistakes and get messy!" I do tend to keep characters safer than I should though and it's something I'm working on. I welcome corrections when I get a rule wrong but may opt to homebrew if I don't like RAW.

Your Fellow Players: This group is rising from the ashes of a d&d5e campaign that stalled out through a combination of my burnout and some medical issues that required a 3 month hiatus anyway. Some of the players are sticking around, but not all. We're pretty much all queer and autistic or ADHD. Our current age range is late 20s to late 30s. English is the language we all speak but we currently have a German player and have had other ESL players in the past.

You: You are an adult whose birth year is 2000 or earlier. You are respectful of other people's boundaries and identities. You are here to have a good time and make some friends. You may not be interested in every game we try but are mostly down to try new games. You could even be interested in running one now and then. You don't need any prior experience playing rpgs.

If you're interested in joining, please send me a message and I'll send you a link to a google form application.

[theundeadgospel]

I’ve never warred with dice more than a fucking d100 simply because it’s that high of a number and my DM refuses to tell me whether or not high or low is better since it’s up to her discretion

but I also love the fact Beth gets divine intervention for free without even being a cleric due to her title lmao doesn’t mean the dice play in my favor though (ever, for that matter) so I have to try and milk the fuck out of it with role-play

but lately we’ve been in gnarly fights that are constantly threatening character death so whenever she gets critically low and cornered, I get hit with the roll d100 and I just KNOW that boney fucker is sitting there watching and wondering if he should commit mass decay and death or see if she can somehow beat the odds and survive (he’s interfered a few times, but never enough to cause direct harm yet)

last session she was staked and grappled into running water, taking mass acid damage and rendered entirely paralyzed — to which laurent disengaged immediately against his slew of enemies to dive into the water after her while myrkul simultaneously had her roll a d100 to see if it was worth interfering but our sorceress vortex warped her out of the water last minute

bro she had both a WHOLE ASS GOD AND LOCKED IN AASIMAR PALADIN READY TO DROP THE BIGGEST FUCKING L ON EVERYONE FOR DOING THAT LMAOOO

[ssoheartbreak]

for the D&D warmup q's, I'd like to ask 1, 7, 55, & 94 please :3

TY for the ask!!! I love doing these for my dnd characters :3 they;re my lil blorbos. Imma do these for the 2characters I'm mostly attached to currently, one is on a break but has like 2years worth of session

What would your character say to the party with their dying breath? Scarab(current) would definitely try to get the party to inform her mother that she passed (she's only child noble, parents should know), but to the party "You've been the best friends I've ever had, thank you for giving this spoilt girl something real" Clover(Main) "Ethos I have loved you like a brother, I'm sorry if I led you down wrong paths but I truly wanted only what was best for you. Terra, I know I've been a nuisance since before I got to Drakkenheim... I thank you for saving Kaz and me from those wolves, and I hope any of the work I've done has helped Drakkenheim....and I guess this world"

7. For what would your character sell their soul? Scarab; actually currently has made a deal with a Devil for "one favour in the future, no questions asked" So that's gonna be fun to explore later :3 It was for the Devil performing a ritual to seal away a creature called the Nightwalker Clover; Unless it was truly world ending(and he believed that) he would never sell his soul

55. If you were granted a wish, what would you ask for? Scarab, at this exact moment? Would wish that "The Duchess"(Beefed up aboleth) was gone/dead/disappeared, In general? Immortality Clover, (The irony is palpable bc he is so close to getting a crown that let's him do wish(likely won't get it though)) If he was granted a single wish it would be to fix/solve something inherently close to the chaos of Drakkenheim

94. Describe your character’s current appearance: clothes, armor, scars they’ve picked up along the journey, etc. Scarab, A 24y/o snow skinned tiefling, with emerald iris set in black sclera, bident forked tail. Short smoky-quartz hair, with charcoal black horns that curve out to the sides and back in in a crescent shape. White and gold trimmed monk gi, Green cloak of protection, dragonhide belt, and bracers of defence. No scars at the moment.

Clover, 32y/o pale half-elf, blue eyes and blond hair. On the taller side, above about 6’1” - 6’3”. Muscular but not from working out, more from farmwork. mining, and smithing. Hands paler than his arms bc of heavy gloves. Blonde hair usually tied but it’s around shoulder/jaw length an awkward first-time goatee kinda thin and wispy, a couple DIY eyebrow and ear piercings. The only noticeable scar he has is in his chest, about a finger's worth of length and width, from when he both took a sacrament(putting toxic magic crystal into his chest) and later removed it(due to not believing in it's power to save us and it turning against him)

TY FOR THE QUESTIONS ^-^!!!

d100 D&D Warm-up Questions

[kittenpower05]

WORK IS SLOW AGAIN im RUNNING OUT OF TTRPGS TO TALK ABOUT

and by that I mean that I should be doing homework instead of rambling about ttrpgs

Anyways Call of Cthulhu ttrpg below cut

First of all shoutout that the gm is called the Keeper? Cool as hell

The wildest thing to me is that in Cthulhu, when you make a skill check, you're rolling a d100, and you're trying to roll *low*. That's straight up bonkers to me! But I get it, I feel you. The stranger thing is that sometimes you want to *fail* checks. Yeah, if you roll low enough on this knowledge roll, you might understand the horrors and if you do, it's the understanding that drives you mad. and I KINDA VIBE WITH THAT. That's really nifty.

But what's really cool is that all of your skills are out of 100, and so when you roll, you're trying to roll under your stat! so instead of the dm wanting you go get a number, you're competing with your own sheet. If the roll is difficult, you need to roll under half your stat. so if i have a know stat of like. 60. Then I'm more likely to pass the stat because I have a 3/5ths chance to roll a number less than 60. And if the task is difficult I have to roll lower than 30. Bonkers stuff.

PUSHING A ROLL OH MY GOD I want pushing a roll to be in dnd so bad. If the player wants to they can straight up roll a stat again, but this time. THE CONSEQUENCES ARE BIGGER. Huge fan of that. Like yeah I want my players to succeed but also it gives heightened stakes which is AWESOME for storytelling

(warning for this paragraph specifically talking about poor representations of mental illness as well as manipulation and unreality) You've got sanity as well as health!!!! Which is actually kind of interesting. I will say, having 'madness' as a mechanic is. yuckyy. to me. I like the concept of giving them a phobia or a mania, since yeah, they could be developed like that! You have a bad experience in the dark, you can get irrationally scared of the dark. You develop negative coping mechanisms. But idk in my mind it feeeeeels bad. To kind of toy around with mental illness :/ It feels more fine if my character has an experience and I'm like "hey I think I'm gonna start playing my character like this because of it" vs I roll bad and the dm goes "Now your character has to be played like this", especially when it comes to madness. Wait sorry holy shit did that passage say that "altered backstories" are kept alongside phobias and manias what the hell are the creatures doing ?????? Oh wait I just considered that the character is an unreliable narrator and could be lied to nvm actually BANGER concept have a dmpc lie to a character about their backstory? Have a flashback thats actually wrong and lying and convince the pc that they were wrong about their backstory when they were right the whole time? Anyways back on topic. This could be fine if the party is chill and doesn't treat mentally ill people awfully! And they actually care about the character even after the bout of madness! But this is a *very* slippery slope and as someone who is not mentally ill I don't trust myself to play a character with delusions or compulsions.

OK we're out of that topic now and it should be less heavy. In Cthulhu? Characters are *very* squishy. They start with low hp, and they only recover one hp a DAY. If their wound is FINE. If they're critically injured then they have to wait a week to get healed. Which I actually really enjoy. In a game about horror? Yeah these guys need to feel like they're in *danger* danger. They aren't expected to fist fight the eldrich being they find on the street, they're just trying to make it to next tuesday. This is very reasonable and fair for the media that they're in and the people they are.

Speaking of! I *really like* playing everyday shmoes. Like yeah i could wield a big sword and slay enemies but this time? I'm gonna be uhhhh college professor. The weird gay person running the museum. author. Like the characters are called "investigators" so they have to have a motivation to go into this field, but the job literally does not come in to play. It gives you your skills and that's it! You get NOTHING from your job on level up because theoretically you're not getting better at your job, you're getting better at beast hunting! SORRY SCRATCH THAT i found a reddit thread that made me fall in love the point of the game is NOT to be the creature hunter of all time. The point of the game is to tell a story about how the more you try and understand the unknowable the more you lose grasp of yourself. Driving yourself crazy trying to figure out something that wasn't for your eyes. The point isn't to get good the point is for the characters to learn more and more about the mythos while their sanity is slowly and irreparably slipping away from them. Fuck yeah hell yeah.

Anyways I was looking up the level up rules. In cthulhu, you don't level up, but you have skill increases! you take note of what you used in each session, and then at the end, the keeper will ask for skill increase rolls. If you *fail* the skill, then you can add more points to it. Which is strange because getting stronger isn't linear (which lets be honest. it isn't in real life lmao) and it isn't guaranteed. I like that it's only on stats that you've rolled successfully, but then fail generally. Because like, yeah I suck at computers but in a stroke of luck I found the shortcut to bring up task manager. Now I've learned something new and can be slightly better at computer. In the game system, this can be represented by like. Like what if my character is socially awkward and hates talking, but in order to survive the BEAST that's hunting them down, they need to be buddy buddy with someone who can potentially protect them. So they go out and try to make friends, and I roll really well on the charm roll, so yay! Friend acquired, and my character is theoretically more confident in their charisma. So at the end of the session, I roll for the charm skill, and I fail the check because my charm is SO low and the only reason I was able to do it before was via stroke of luck, but *since* I failed I can improve that charm stat! And now I'm less likely to fail in the future! And also, it will make leveling it up much harder!

Anyways now I'm thinking about Hildy Russet dndads and despite me not listening to mountains of dadness im rotating her in my mind palace, im going to get back to work and hopefully not think too much about narrative tragedies and eldritch horror

[sychik-personal]

Orchideus Thyrsus, year 1: summer

summer is a long period: two seasons in one, 8 days total or 4 'years'. despite that, not much has happened in the emperor's household. I probably should reorganize things a bit and move the nursery closer to the kitchen and servant's quarters, because logistics is my biggest problem right now. I also have rolled for deaths for all currently existing sims (it's 1/4 for baby/toddler - then they aren't born at all, 1/12 child, 1/12 teen and 1/8 adult). what I'll do is I will roll d100 for each unlucky sim every day when they get to the corresponding age, and if it's 1-10, then it's done. if they are really lucky, they'll die just before aging up.

back to the main branch. Vaio is apparently a disappointing emperor, but there's no one to challenge his rule, so good for him. he has gotten to lvl. 4 of his career and upped his charisma to 2 but his logic points are back to 0 because of his poor decisions. Tara's mechanical skill is now worth 5 points - she was trying to learn to use the loom, but it was in vain, because she keeps resetting whenever I click it (probably something to do with Royalty trait, but I am not sure). Sciura had to learn to use the loom instead of her master, but she wasn't very successful; neither was Tara at sewing. the home business thing isn't working out at all. unfortunately, I don't have any interesting pictures for any of the above :(

Sciura grew up into an adult. I noticed that she was unhappy a little too late, but I managed to lock the first kiss wish. as summer is very long, I decided to not wait until Nero would grow up as well (he's almost there, honest), and invited him anyway. well... they did have their first kiss, but then they went to woohoo in the emperor's double bed before I could stop them. ACR and its magic. what's funny is that Sciura is a Family sim, but I guess the girl just knows what she wants. I'm not too upset - they seem to love each other, and Sciura was getting a very inappropriate lightning towards Vaio (I suspected this would be the case). as for when to marry and move them out, I think I'll follow their rolled wishes.

now, my favorite part, the children!

Azalea was born somewhere in the middle of the long summer. she reminds me more of her father, just like Clematis.

both Dahlia and Clematis have also grown up. Dahlia is Nice, Serious and Active, while Clematis is Playful and Nice - a good-natured troublemaker, it seems. again, I don't have any screenshots, but Dahlia seems to get along with Sciura really well, probably better than with her mother.

a father-daughter moment:

the whole family really likes to read. Sciura included, so I'll just pretend they taught her as well.

increase in funds: 21,040 → 24,282 (so, not a lot)

[jayjtheunsuspiciousmelodicathem]

hi yes I'm mostly a 5e GM (trying to get my groups to play longer non-D&D campaigns with various degrees of success) but I've studied AD&D2e for quite a while now (I do want to run a game in it one day to see how it played in practice and maybe take away some new tools for other systems) so I feel like I'm qualified to answer

Now, first of all, the term "edition" originally meant as much as "revision" - AD&D1e and AD&D2e were pretty much the same system, but 2e revised basically how the system was written and divided into books (Gygax wrote the player's handbook without all info a player should know, and most of the important stuff was contained in the DMG, 2e divided the contents more fairly). And this definition of "edition" still holds up for other systems! I have a copy of Call of Cthulhu 2e (a contemporary of AD&D) a copy of Call of Cthulhu 7e (contemporary of 5e), and I saw a PDF of 6e, and tell you what, the systems are pretty much the same, give or take a couple skills - 7e is by far the largest outlier, but you can still take stuff from 6e and use it with 7e with minimal adjustments.

I mention that, because when it comes to D&D, everything went south in that regard. AD&D2e, AD&D1e, D&D BECMI (which stands for Basic-Expert-Companion-Master-Immortals - essentially a simpler version of D&D intended as an introductory point and more casual than Advanced D&D which was intended to be more of a "tournament" ruleset. It started with Becmi and expanded to Expert, and the further letters are just additional rules), and then Original D&D (the one released in 1974, "white box") worked on a vastly different engine than 5e. These editions, which I will collectively call Gygaxian, were pretty much 100% compatible with each other, and you could, with minimal adjustments, run the original Ravenloft module (intended for 1e) with the BECMI rules, or AD&D2e rules, or if you're feeling particularly hardcore, even the Original rules.

Meanwhile 5e works on an engine we know as "the d20 system", first introduced in D&D3e at the turn of the millenia, which overhauled the entire game.

So, AD&D2e in its core rules features six stats - Strength, Constitution, Dexterity, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma. The way these stats work is that depending on how high you rolled on character creation (and you would most often roll just 3d6 depending on your GM) is that they don't give you a uniform stat bonus like in 5e, but instead they kind of give you another set of stats. This is the table of bonuses for strength

Hit probability - your attack bonus (which you would actually subtract from your roll but more on that later) Damage adjustment - your damage bonus. Notice that it doesn't align with the hit probability; in 5e 18str gives you +4 to hit and +4 to damage. Weight Allowance - basically how much more you can carry in pounds. Maximum Press - how much you can lift and hold over your head in pounds Open Doors - The door is stuck or heavy or barricaded, and you want to get in, so you roll this. It's a d20 roll and you must roll equal or lower than the number appropriate for your strength. If you have high enough strength to have a number in parentheses, this means you get a single chance to try to force a barricaded, locked or magically held door. Bend Bars/Lift Gates - a d100 roll, low is better. Basically what it says on the box - you try to bend iron bars or lift a heavy gate

Now you may have noticed that the 18 is a bit weird. There's a plain 18 and then there's all of those 18/XX - what's that about? Well, this is yet another oddity of gygaxian D&D. Warrior characters (fighters, paladins, rangers), if they had an 18 in strength, they got to roll a d100 (unless they were a halfling) for exceptional strength. You would note the number you rolled as a decimal next to the 18, and read the table at an appropriate range

So for example, Strahd Von Zarovich in the 2e reprint of the original Ravenloft module was assigned two strengths - 18.00 for the corrected version, and 18.76 for the original version. This means that he has a whooping +3 to hit, +6 to damage, can carry 335 pounds, can lift 480, has an 80% chance of opening a door (with 30% chance of getting past a barricade, lock, or magic lock), and a 40% chance to successfully bend bars open in 2e, using the corrected statblock.

The other stats were similar, but each had different derivative stats - dex had adjustments for missile attacks, reaction time and AC, wisdom had saving throw adjustments and cleric/druid spells, intelligence dictated your languages, proficiencies (if you used them), wizard spells etc. Fun fact, you had a stat called "resurrection survival", because complications during resurrections are fun /half sarcastic (I have a character whose entire deal is that his resurrection went wrong and he's one of my absolute all-time faves).

Basically nothing was uniform - in 5e you just roll six numbers and you have a universal stat bonus formula you apply to all numbers and boom, you have +1 +4 +2 0 -1 +5 bonuses from your stats. Some calculations like encumbrance or jump distance might ask you to take either the score or the bonus and put them in a formula, but they're not as important. Also hit and damage bonuses are now usually the same.

Oh right I forgot to mention, the current line of D&D editions is technically a continuation of the AD&D line, D&D basic having been discontinued. Which is why we went from AD&D2e and D&DBECMI to just D&D3e. As I said D&D really pushes the definition of an edition.

Now let's move on to the races. Humans in 2e have only one major advantage over the other races - they can be any class without any level caps, and they don't have minimum-maximum ability scores other than the 3-18 range.

The races also gave you some other bonuses like elves and half-elves have sleep and charm spell resistance, ability to spot hidden and secret doors, dwarves have poison saving throw bonuses, dwarves and gnomes can tell where they are underground etc

Now in 5e, races work completely differently - for starters, there are no race-class combination restrictions based on a surface level copypaste of Tolkien! 2e and 5e were written with different philosphies - in 2e creatures, classes and races were stronger, so they had restrictions imposed on them to keep things "fair", while in 5e you have races and classes that have thousands of unrestricted combinations, but their features are largely toned down and balanced.

I won't go over each class in detail, but in 2e classes had very little horizontal progression like 5e has. Warriors got a level-dependent "attacks per round" where you progressed up to 2 attacks per round, half an attack per six levels (1-6 1/round; 7-12 1.5/round , 13+ 2/round; the 1.5 meant 1 attack this round, 2 attacks the next, or vice versa), wizards and clerics got more spells, rogues got higher percentages in thieving skills (which were the only kind of rigid skill system D&D had for a long time before 3e). At a particualrly high level the character could get basically a lair - warriors got a castle, wizards a wizard tower, priests can pretty much set up a new parish or become an arch druid in a duel or another trial - which would attract followers, which were an important part of the game

You see, in gygaxian D&D characters were much weaker - each character got an additional hit die each level, up until level 10 or 11, when they just stagnate at 9 or 10 dice, and just start adding a bonus - a lvl10 fighter for example has 9d10+3 hp, at which point they also don't receive constitution HP bonuses anymore. Then at lvl11 they'd have 9d10+6hp. If I'm understanding the rules correctly, you don't reroll the entire formula, you just roll or add the amount that wasn't previously there (unless you're on lvl 10 or 11 where you have to remove all constitution bonuses). And with maybe two special abilities, many of which have a frequency like "once per week", you weren't exactly the most fearsome enemy. So you would have a lot of henchmen by your side, essentially being a small army.

5e meanwhile is not suited for such gameplay - hell it struggles when you have more than four enemies. Combat in 2e was more focused on side initiative rather than individual initiative, so your party may act first, but you all pretty much shout your actions (or if you're a nice group - wait your turn for the GM to ask what you're doing this turn), do them, and then the GM does the enemies' actions.

2e had also a greater variety of weapons, which had two damage dice - one for small and medium targets, and one for large targets, which honestly I wish stayed, because it allows for so much more variety in weapons. MOST WEAPONS ON THE TABLE WERE POLEARMS, HISTORICALLY THE BEST FAMILY OF WEAPONS.

but now I need to talk about the elephant in the room

THAC0

Many people loved it, many found it confusing, I find it charming.

THAC0 stands for "to hit armour class 0". In Gygaxian D&D, AC went from -10 through 10. AC-10 corresponds to modern AC30, AC0 corresponds to modern AC20, AC10 corresponds to modern AC10.

What this means, is the number you have to roll on your die - the natural roll - to hit a creature with an AC of 0 (or modern day AC of 20). Each character has their own THAC0 value dependent on class and level - warriors for example had lower THAC0 (which was better) with every level, while other classes had to wait two or more levels before their THAC0 improved.

In 5e to hit a creature you roll a d20, add your stat bonus, proficiency bonus, and any weapon or spell bonus you have. the higher the number the better. If it matches or surpasses the target number (enemy AC), you hit. Nat20 is auto-hit and a crit. Nat1 is an auto fail.

In 2e however, you take your THAC0 - the roll you need to hit an AC0 creature. Let's say you're a 7th lvl fighter with 18.50 strength. Your THAC0 is 14, your to-hit bonus is +1, and let's say you have a +1 sword too. You adjust the THAC0 by subtracting your bonuses from the number, so 14-1-1=12. You need to roll a 12 to hit a creature with modern AC20. Then you subtract the enemy AC (which is a bit of an issue but I'll get to that later) from your THAC0, so let's say you're fighting Strahd Von Zarovich who has an an AC of 1 (modern AC19 - not the actual AC of modern Strahd). So 12-1=11. To hit Strahd in his stupid face you need to roll a nat11 or higher on your d20.

In other words, it's a very backwards version of the modern attack roll.

THAC0 is basically modern AC20, with your to-hit bonus from your level subtracted. All characters start with THAC0 of 20, so that's +0. Warriors get +1 to hit for each level above 1, so a lvl7 fighter has +6 to hit. 20-6=14 (your base THAC0), OR 14+6=20. Then when you apply your other bonuses it starts looking like this: 20-6-1-1=12, or 12+6+1+1=20. The AC serves as another adjustment - right now you're trying to hit a modern AC of 20, remember. But it can be higher or lower, and Strahd happens to have an AC lower than that (AC1), so you adjust it to 19-6-1-1=11 or 11+6+1+1=19.

What's happening here is that you're trying to find the number you want to roll or roll over before you make the roll.

"but wait" you ask "how am I supposed to know the enemy's AC without metagaming?" well either you're so used to fighting goblins by now that you just remember their AC, or you invert the formula! Many players would calculate not "how high to hit this particular enemy?" but "how high of an AC can I hit with this roll?"

So you would roll your die, add the bonuses you have on your sheet - let's say your fighter rolled a 9. You have +1 to hit from your strength, +1 from your magic sword, so you rolled 11. Now subtract that from your base THAC0 - 14-11=3. With that we've calculated that a roll of 9 for this fighter hits an AC of 3, which in modern D&D would be AC17.

Another one. The fighter rolls a 19, adds the +1 and +1. Your adjusted roll is 21. 14-21=-7 - you can hit a creature whose modern AC would be 27.

This is a very weird system rooted in the origins of D&D, but it's kind of charming in a way, and once you understand it it's honestly not that scary. Just unintuitive. Thankfully they changed the way AC works, thus allowing for a simple roll+add=hit.

Also you may notice that with this way of rolling, there might be some ACs that are impossible to hit - nat20s and nat1s are still there to make your hard battles even more memorable!

Oh and spells were prepared by preparing each instance of casting a spell, meaning if you plan on casting fireball three times today, you need to spend three spell slots on preparing fireball.

I hope the ramble makes any sense, especially in the THAC0 section, because I started getting a bit tired in the middle of typing. And I hope it answers anyone's questions about the mechanical differences between 2e and 5e!

JayJay out

Images taken from various pages of the revised AD&D2e player's handbook

what's the difference between ad&d and regular ol 5e?

I'm legally not allowed to answer this question lest the weight of ancient pissing matches descends upon me, but I think the way 5e balances character/party utility (one person not being allowed to dominate the entire thing) and "being able to take suboptimal options and not have it ruin your entire class function" is a good difference.

[radramblog]

Dice, ranked

 Players of tabletop games, among other things, tend to get to hoard-like levels when it comes to amassing collections of the tools of the trade- dice. As a result, people tend to get pretty obsessive about their favourites- ones they’ve paid excessive amounts for and therefore are extremely fancy, ones associated with a particularly memorable moment from one game or another, ones they send to jail for rolling too many ones.

I’ve never really understood this (except for dice jail, they know what they did). I got two sets of dice (lost the d6 from one of them, replaced it) and they work fine for just about everything. So I’m probably not the guy to turn to for this sort of topic.

What I haven’t seen is someone discussing on a meta level the ups and downs of each dice, and therefore, ranking them into an opinionated list. And since opinions are fun and I thought this would be as well, I’m going to spend some time writing about and ranking dice.

#7- d4

I feel like the d4 being the worst dice is not a controversial opinion. They’re incredibly awkward to actually roll, requiring a bit of extra effort to clear the first edge on the table, and considering the piddly numbers that come up it never feels worth it. They are also incredibly replaceable, being easily substitutable by a d6, d8, or even a d10/12 in a pinch.

This is of course avoiding the most important point, which is that it’s not hard for dice to end up on the floor, and stepping on one of these fuckers is worse than any lego piece. I know someone who has a metal set of dice, and its d4 is sharp enough to draw blood. Yikes.

 #6- d10

The d10 has always bugged me design-wise. Like, I’m sure there probably wasn’t that much of a better way to design this dice- the odds one side/evens another strikes me as strange, as is it theoretically being substantially more likely to roll from an odd to an odd than an odd to an even, or vice versa, based on the way it’s laid out. Of course, I’m no expert.

Much like the d4, you could probably replace this with a d20, but it’s less cumbersome, so I imagine few bother. It’s also got bigger numbers on it, which is nice, but I swear every time I look at a game’s rules I forget whether the 0 is supposed to be 0 or 10, especially since it differs between systems and in some cases lower is actually better. Should I be happy about rolling a fat nothing? We just don’t know.

 #5- d6

As tempted as I was to put this at #6 for shits and giggles, I really can’t justify doing that based on my reasons for keeping the classic dice this low. And in fact, that’s entirely why this is so low, out of spite. So many fucking board games use d6s, to the point that other dice are seen by the vast majority of people as an oddity.

And the “standard die” is so boring. It’s a cube. The most perfectly generic object in three-dimensional space. They don’t even put numbers on it, where’s the fun in that? Bleh.

 #4- d12

Right in the middle, we have the d12, which may be an odd choice. The reason I’ve put the d12 in the dead centre is that it’s the one I have the least opinions about. It’s the forgotten dice, to me. I can’t remember the last time I’ve played a game where I needed it, even though I’m sure it hasn’t been that long. Whenever I’m gathering all my dice back up, I always count that I’m missing one, and it’s just about always the d12 I’ve forgotten.

It is the most forgettable die. And for that, it gets the forgettable slot.

 #3- Percentile die

Unlike it’s perennial counterpart, the d10, the percentile dice is interesting. It’s got really big numbers on it, giving it a completely different look, and 00 is not nearly as confusing as 0.

But what makes the percentile die the most fun is that rolling d100, which is what you’re typically doing with it, is so fun. Because if you’re rolling that, typically there’s a huge variety of different effects that could happen, and both you and the DM are rubbing your hands with glee at how things are going to land. Because it’s likely something they’ve spent a lot of time working on, and can’t wait to see play out- and in my experience, a happy DM is a happy player. Unless it’s a kill-happy DM, but honestly, if there’s a d100 involved at least my character is getting horrifically mutilated in a fun and unique manner.

Of course, there are some games in which the d100 is a standard stat check. And in those games, the percentile is likely less interesting, which is fair. But I haven’t played many of those games.

 #2- d20

The wizened among you will realise what #1 is now, and hold your horses, we’ll get there, but first is the runner up. The d20 is iconic to role-playing games, to a point where there’s multiple games, softwares, and media (podcasts etc) that use it as part of their branding. It’s standard for D&D, the most popular tabletop RPG out there, and is commonly used by both its imitators and completely separate games for a huge number of rolls and checks and the like. Save for percentile, it’s the only one of these where searching just “d20″ only gave dice-related results on google images.

The d20 gets a lot of points for the joy of rolling a nat 20. It also loses a lot of points for the terror of rolling a nat 1.

D20s are not without flaw. The small faces make them extremely easy to over-roll into and off of things, if you’re a clown like me without a dice tray- though that can be a strength, with the extended roll time being that little bit more suspenseful. As mentioned earlier, they can be extremely polarising, with the gap between a successful and unsuccessful roll being potentially huge.

But I think mostly I’m just kind of biased because they’re a huge pain in the ass to use to track your life in MtG, even though you start at 20, unless you use a spindown d20, but those are often not considered acceptable in other tabletop settings. And I have so, so many spindowns at this point.

 #1: d8

I guess I have to justify my choices, huh.

Look, there’s something about the octahedral die that I find incredibly satisfying. They’re a great shape, they roll easy, and 8 is a really nice number to do maths with. I’m actually shocked that board games ended up with d6 as the default when the maths of a d8 is probably so much easier to balance around. I blame the d6 monopoly on Monopoly.

Ironically I think the d6’s omnipresence makes me like the d8 more, as it feels like a little bonus.

They have the same odd/even divide as a d10, but the shape of each face is equilateral so it doesn’t feel as biased. It’s a fun dice that I get to use often. It’s not as polarising as a d20, nor as awkward as a d4. I just really like these. Humble and unassuming, I cannot possibly justify this beyond that.

I should go collect more.