lichbarry

[lichbarry]

In the D&D campaign I'm running with my wife's siblings, one of them learned about how trolls regenerate within minutes of any damage not caused by fire or acid, and then asked why people don't just like. Cage them and eat them, forever. Why there aren't troll meat dungeons in the king's castle as a safeguard against sieges or famines.

And you know, I thought it was a fair question, so I said that if you eat enough troll meat, you start getting troll-y. And then I went further and just treated it like troll flesh is a general contaminant - if you eat enough troll, you'll turn into a troll, but if you bury enough dead troll flesh in a forest, the trees will start growing in strange ways, and will scream and heal and bleed when you hit them with axes.

I liked this idea. So as we played further, I just played around with the idea of Troll Origins, and I came up with something sort of like the Odyssey, but instead stealing Helios's cattle, it was Hathor's, and the horrible, awful, unending immortality was her curse of the army that pillaged her lands. A god of healing does not condemn you to die, she condemns you to live.

And then I got this fun idea for maybe the king that led the army is still kind of alive in the troll taint. Like a sort of literal fisher king. The kingdom is sick because he is, literally, the kingdom. The trees that bleed, bleed his blood and their screams are his screams. He is both the faintly green bear running down the mountain and the faintly green deer and there is no way past this without suffering. He is the entire ecosystem, and he eats nothing but himself and he dreams nothing but death and yet still, on and on and on and on, he lives.

Anyway they're traveling next session so I'm throwing this shit at them. I already have some gross ideas for like. Describing everything like it's a body (flowers red as blood, white as bone, pink as meat, grass fine as hair) then finally throwing horrible living things at them. Trees that grow eyeballs that turn and stare at them, or flowers with teeth instead of petals and trolls that speak in long dead tongues about how they wish they'd never tried to rob a god.

Anyway I'm passing this on because this is my new troll lore and I want it to become canonized in the way that all D&D lore becomes canonized: By having eople read it and go "oh, neat" then start doing that too.

[lichbarry]

Hey Aabria!

I’m interested in running a game using the same mechanics as you did in MisMag2 and I know it’s just an expanded Kids on Brooms system but I was wondering if you had any set mechanics or rules for the system that couldn’t be reversed engineered from watching the season again. Thank you in advance and I hope you’re having an amazing day!

I've been in this stupid gutter for like 60 years, and I still NEVER see my inbox. Thank you for the reminder that I should polish up those mechanics to share! My quick and dirty answer without looking at ANY of my technical docs for fear of falling in a little hyperfix hole is: - base 6 stats [brains/brawn/fight/flight/grit/charm] reskinned with M-words (along with Adversity Tokens: they're Motes of Magic now, baby, and you WILL regret this bit almost immediately) - mechanic from MM1 lost: Common-Fucking-Sense die. - 7th stat added: Mark. This one's fills the gap for Perception/Insight and can only be rolled as a snap decision because it's about what you notice, not what you focus on. (If I let them take half of their die during the season, it's because I'm a goddamn softie that doesn't actually say "no" to them enough) - Magic Track: starts as a d4 and ramps. At a d20, create a magic item with a consistent magical effect. Item can be destroyed for 10 Motes of Magic. Then reset track at d4. - Motive Track: 7 point (-3 to +3) scale to chart play against player-derived ideal; this was a quick & dirty solve for the lack of leveling in KoB, especially as it intersected with the changes of the PCs 3 years after the events of S1. I may be remembering this incorrectly, so I reserve the right for this to be different later, but at a -3, one stat's die type increases (while another decreases). At a +3, one die type increases without lowering another. Work with your player to make the change consistent with the PC's relationship to their Motive. At this point, the Motive can be changed and the track is reset. - DCs begin HIGH in this system, because play will quickly make the party hyper-competent via Motes and Magic Item creation. Any specific questions?

[lichbarry]

honestly the most intense combat of any dimension 20 season so far

[lichbarry]

[ID: A digital drawing of Veth Brenatto from Critical Role. She is visible from the neck up, facing three quarters to the left and looking off to the right with a smile. She's wearing a wide brimmed hat and a green neckerchief decorated with buttons. End description.]

A warm up doodle of Veth 💛

[lichbarry]

*holds your hand* OUR doomed narrative now

[lichbarry]

I mean, what else is there to say? Dimension 20 - On A Bus was one of the greatest first episodes of D20 to date. Incredible players, stellar setting, and AMAZING DM-ing by Katie! For a first time running a game, she absolutely NAILED it. I had my doubts, but if there's anyone who can fill Brennan's American Girl Shoes, it's her. @dropoutdottv @dimension20official @gamechangershow, if you need someone to do character art for the new season, I'm your man!

(And to everyone else, I do actual D&D commissions if you're interested)

[lichbarry]

"stardust how bad could it have possibly been"

(twitter xpost)

[lichbarry]

A mech discord server with a vent channel where all the messages are just ‘FWSSHHHHHH -heat level reduced’

[lichbarry]

fanfic writers will go "anyone gonna explore the kinda fucked up or emotionally impactful implications of this minor canon detail?" and then not wait for an answer.

[lichbarry]

I've got a stupid outer wilds confession to make...

when I started playing the game, I was convinced Slate was a woman because their name in spanish is Launa (which sounds like a woman's name I GUESS + we don't have gender neutral pronouns) and FOR SOME REASON I thought they were the hatchling's mother...? so every time I woke up from a loop I'd say "hi mama!!!" when I saw them.. then I finished the game and found out these fishes are genderless and Slate was ABSOLUTELY NOT MY MAMA... 😔

yes, I saw this and thought "YEP, THAT'S MOTHER"

now that I know The Truth I feel so silly for thinking all of that but I can't help but wonder... did any of you think slate was a woman.. AM I THE ONLY ONE WHO THOUGHT SLATE WAS A WOMAN??????

[lichbarry]

the drawfee Bobby hill face

that is all

day 36 i. i'm scared.

-💫

[lichbarry]

you know how little kids like to interview people?

[lichbarry]

chat is it okay to be in love with a fictional woman

[lichbarry]

*This poll was submitted to us and we simply posted it so people could vote and discuss their opinions on the matter. If you’d like for us to ask the internet a question for you, feel free to drop the poll of your choice in our inbox and we’ll post them anonymously (for more info, please check our pinned post).

[lichbarry]

Starting a new sports team called the Tampa Bay Trespassers and they play any sport that they can break onto the field of

[lichbarry]

What a wonderful piece of media! Surely the fandom will be literate and normal

[lichbarry]

"just write the story you want to read!" they said. well, guess what, now i have 14 unfinished drafts because apparently, i want to read 14 different stories at once.