Pen & Paper Role Playing Games

General Specific

General Specific

Shawn said:
Hoping for the forum's help with a short story.

I'm going to run a Ravenloft game in a few days and I want to open the campaign with a creepy fairy tale.

The idea I have for it is a standard 3 fools and a clever man scenario.

A stranger offers each of the men a wish, but the clever man knows this is a witch who will devour any man she grants a wish for.
The 3 fools wish away and the clever man either refrains to wish or makes a clever wish that would absolve him of being eaten.
In the end the clever man wakes up the next morning to find he is being carted away in an animal cage by the witch, his family near him either also caged or already prepared for cooking.
He asks why she would take him when there were three fools basically throwing themselves at her oven. In response she says "The foolish are plentiful and lack pleasant taste. But a clever man is a savory banquet."

It's essentially where I want things to go. Just a quick tale to set the dark mood of Ravenloft. I'll probably call it a Barovian Fairy Tale.
I'm just trying to think of some elements to add that will make the twist even more hopeless. Maybe something that the clever man does that really makes you think he has the witch beat, only to find out later that it only sealed his doom.
Thank you in advance for any suggestions you guys post.
Click to expand...
So going back and reading this thread while bored at work and I instantly came up with an idea for this. I know it's months late, but I'd like to put it down anyway.

Clever guy asks the witch what her wish would be. She says, "To be out of this cursed swamp*!" So his wish is that the witch would be "Out of this cursed swamp." Twist is that she had actually been cursed to stay in the swamp and forced to grant others' wishes. She worked out pretty quickly she could grant them however she liked. The curse meant she could only use her magic to free herself if someone made an appropriate wish. Now that she is free, she acts grateful, transports the man home, and the next morning he finds himself and his family bound as described.



* - I picked "swamp" randomly, it can be changed to whatever serves the setting
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
I am SO rusty at Killing Floor 2. Popped in to just blow off some steam, and I used to be able to solo on the hardest difficulty ("Hell on Earth") pretty reliably... but I was struggling on "Suicidal" (second hardest) even on my best class (a 25 berserker that's been prestige ranked 5 times - the most you can). Clearly too much bloons and Vermintide has made me soft. Gotta get that murderfocus back.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
A buddy of mine wanted to try out The Forest, so I started up a dedicated server.

It's VERY buggy but pretty engaging. For those not familiar with it, it's a survival/crafting first person game where you are the survivor of a plane crash way out in the forest. Complicating your survival is that apparently there are tribes of feral cannibals in said forest. Beyond surviving, you are also tasked to learn the fates of the other passengers on your flight (one of the first things you find in the plane wreckage is the passenger manifest), and of course, find out why there are cannibals and why some of them seem to be growing extra limbs.

If anybody wants in let me know, I'll send you the password to get on the server. It's a lot more blood-and-horror than Valheim (and most other survival-crafters for that matter).
 
evilmike

evilmike

figmentPez said:
View attachment 41532
Click to expand...
This reminds me of Aaron Allston's classic player breakdown:
  • A third early attempt at archetype classification was made in 1988 by author and game-designer Aaron Allston, who included a list of the Types of Champions Players in Strike Force, his award-winning campaign supplement for that game. The list applies to players of nearly any Tabletop RPG, and has inspired terminology used in many later discussions, though it is phrased in terms that make it most applicable to superhero games. In the form found in the most recent edition of Strike Force, the types are:
    • The Builder, who wants to have an impact on the world.
    • The Buddy, who comes to the game to be with their friend(s), and while they're having fun, they're not as deep into the game as everyone else.
    • The Combat Monster, who wants combat, pure and simple; their fun is wrapped up in beating the bad guys.
    • The Copier, who is interested in recreating a character based on something they've seen in other media, and thus can be counted on to make a character who is (for example) a Batman clone or a Spider-Man homage.
    • The Genre Fiend, who wants to model everything after established genre tropes, and is disappointed when the GM veers from the genre norms.
    • The Mad Slasher, who kills everything that moves, no reason needed.
    • The Mad Thinker, who seeks clever solutions to in-game problems.
    • The Plumber, who wants intricate characters with deep, complicated backgrounds and motivations, and expects exploration thereof.
    • The Pro from Dover, who desires a character who is the best in their field, whatever that field happens to be.
    • The Romantic, who player focuses on relationships and character interaction.
    • The Rules Exploiter, who is primarily interested in bending the rules in order to min/max their character as much as possible.
    • The Showoff, who seeks the most spotlight time for their own character, usually at the expense of the other characters.
    • The Tragedian, who wants their character to suffer, and to play that suffering out.
(TVTopes)​

Though having some aspects of both The Plumber and The Tragedian, everyone always classified me as The Mad Thinker.

Anyone else have a classification they wish to share?
 
Tinwhistler

Tinwhistler

evilmike said:
This reminds me of Aaron Allston's classic player breakdown:
  • A third early attempt at archetype classification was made in 1988 by author and game-designer Aaron Allston, who included a list of the Types of Champions Players in Strike Force, his award-winning campaign supplement for that game. The list applies to players of nearly any Tabletop RPG, and has inspired terminology used in many later discussions, though it is phrased in terms that make it most applicable to superhero games. In the form found in the most recent edition of Strike Force, the types are:
    • The Builder, who wants to have an impact on the world.
    • The Buddy, who comes to the game to be with their friend(s), and while they're having fun, they're not as deep into the game as everyone else.
    • The Combat Monster, who wants combat, pure and simple; their fun is wrapped up in beating the bad guys.
    • The Copier, who is interested in recreating a character based on something they've seen in other media, and thus can be counted on to make a character who is (for example) a Batman clone or a Spider-Man homage.
    • The Genre Fiend, who wants to model everything after established genre tropes, and is disappointed when the GM veers from the genre norms.
    • The Mad Slasher, who kills everything that moves, no reason needed.
    • The Mad Thinker, who seeks clever solutions to in-game problems.
    • The Plumber, who wants intricate characters with deep, complicated backgrounds and motivations, and expects exploration thereof.
    • The Pro from Dover, who desires a character who is the best in their field, whatever that field happens to be.
    • The Romantic, who player focuses on relationships and character interaction.
    • The Rules Exploiter, who is primarily interested in bending the rules in order to min/max their character as much as possible.
    • The Showoff, who seeks the most spotlight time for their own character, usually at the expense of the other characters.
    • The Tragedian, who wants their character to suffer, and to play that suffering out.
(TVTopes)​

Though having some aspects of both The Plumber and The Tragedian, everyone always classified me as The Mad Thinker.

Anyone else have a classification they wish to share?
Click to expand...
I used to be at one point the Mad Thinker, and the Combat Monster+Rules Exploiter at another. These days, I'm more of a pure RPGer. The way I approach games these days doesn't fit into those categories. Instead, I treat my character like I would a character in a book I'm writing: I try to figure out a plausible enough backstory to get them to where the story starts (but not "The Plumber" levels of detail) and then I make all of my decisions based solely on what I feel the character would do under those circumstances and with that background. For me, the fun these days isn't in points (levels, xp, gold, whatever) but in the improv of a totally different personality from that personality's point of view to the best of my ability.
 
evilmike

evilmike

It wasn't that I was trying to be the Mad Thinker. I was happy being the guy with the detailed backstory/tragic past/secret power that almost never got mentioned (because what's the point in having character depth if you dump all of your info in the first 20 minutes of the first game session?) It's just that my Mad Thinker nature would always shine through. We were a group of mostly engineering students, playing in superhero or sci-fi games, so problem solving was often the default. I was also the senior GM of the group, which meant that, when I was playing in someone else's game, I had experience out thinking them. :)
 
Frank

Frank

Hey, my Pathfinder Kingmaker 10th anniversary stuff showed up, years late, but here it is.

Oh of course they fucked up the fulfillment, of course they did.

1663721294568.png
 
figmentPez

figmentPez

Staff member
Is the icing in your decorating kit too runny to turn a gingerbread house into a tower? Just go horizontal and build gingerbread D&D terrain!
 
phil

phil

@Li3n said:
You know, this makes me wonder if Paizo saw some signs a few years ago, and that's the real reason why they did 2e even though they originally promised they wouldn't do new edition when 1e came out:

www.polygon.com

Paizo commits to legal battle against Wizards over the future of Pathfinder and D&D

RPG publisher steals the initiative along with allies Kobold Press, Chaosium, and Legendary Games
www.polygon.com www.polygon.com
Click to expand...

Maybe. Good on them for going to bat over this. The whole debacle has been just insane. All the lies and spin coming from wotc has been wild and incredibly off putting.
 
HCGLNS

HCGLNS

It is some what amusing that a Pen & Paper game maker forgot that we could play the game with just pens and paper. We don't truly need your digital subscription to manage our stuff.
 
@Li3n

@Li3n

phil said:
The whole debacle has been just insane. All the lies and spin coming from wotc has been wild and incredibly off putting.
Click to expand...

Hasbro with former M$ management...

HCGLNS said:
We don't truly need your digital subscription to manage our stuff.
Click to expand...
The worse parts where not even about that.

Even during the Golden Age of comics, when artists that where not Bob Kane got screwed over all the time, no one ever attempted to get them to sign over previous rights if they wanted to continue working with a company.
 
HCGLNS

HCGLNS

@Li3n said:
Hasbro with former M$ management...



The worse parts where not even about that.

Even during the Golden Age of comics, when artists that where not Bob Kane got screwed over all the time, no one ever attempted to get them to sign over previous rights if they wanted to continue working with a company.
Click to expand...
I was referring to the worlds response. It was leaked that one of their primary metrics was D&DBeyond subscriptions, so everyone just noped out and referenced OGL 1.1 as the reason why. Oops.

gizmodo.com

Cancelled D&D Beyond Subscriptions Forced Hasbro's Hand

Swift consumer action prompted Dungeons & Dragons publisher Wizards of the Coast to to scrap licensing updates. The players aren't done yet.
gizmodo.com gizmodo.com

As always currency communicates!
 
@Li3n

@Li3n

HCGLNS said:
I was referring to the worlds response. It was leaked that one of their primary metrics was D&DBeyond subscriptions, so everyone just noped out and referenced OGL 1.1 as the reason why. Oops.
Click to expand...
Ah, you meant that it was easier for people to quit it in protest, because they can still play either way, so it's not much of a "sacrifice".

True...
 
Shakey

Shakey

Their push for digital first with the dragon lance release, and their plans to continue that with more micro transactions, just left a bad taste with me. It feels like they’re completely abandoning the local game shops, and I have a feeling it will backfire on them in the long run. Digital is convenient, and I think it should be an option, but don’t abandon what got you there.
 
Dave

Dave

Staff member
I missed the boat getting Ironwood ready for publishing. I'd have given it away for free.
 
HCGLNS

HCGLNS

Basically, lawyers have hoodwinked users for years. OGL was never legally necessary, but they convinced us it was. Rules never have been able to be copyright. Thanks accountants!
 
Krisken

Krisken

Yup, pretty much. They relied on confusion on what could be copywrited for a lot of it, as well as having money for lawyers. Typical capitalist big company BS.
 
@Li3n

@Li3n

I mean, the OGL was an attempt to distance themselves from TheySueRegularly...

And you can easily see that they knew it was unlikely that they could actually win a legal battle with anyone that could afford it about the copyright for what was in the SRD by the fact that they kept "Product Identity" monsters (aka what the lawyers thought they could legally protect) out of it, even though some of those where even clearly copied from somewhere else (which is why some ppl just used other names for them).

That being said, youtube is proof enough that the OGL did help the community grow because of the lack of wrongful removals, frivolous suing etc.
 
@Li3n

@Li3n

gsllcblog.com

Part 1: Copyrightability of #RPG Stat Blocks #DnD #copyright #iplaw

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 3.5 | FAQ/FRI I received an email from Wizards of the Coast (“WotC”) demanding that I take down my one-stop stat blocks. Unsurprisingly, the email didn’t provide an …
gsllcblog.com gsllcblog.com

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Part 2: Copyrightability of #RPG Abilities and Spells #DnD #copyright #iplaw

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 3.5 | FAQ/FRI In case it isn’t clear, WotC does not endorse this post or any work I’ve created. My use of their trademarks is purely to identify the subject of this …
gsllcblog.com gsllcblog.com

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Part 3: The Damage Done by the Otherwise Ineffectual Open Gaming License #DnD #copyright #iplaw #ogl

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 3.5 | FAQ/FRI If you enjoy this post, please retweet it. This is the last in a series of three posts on the copyright misuse of Wizards of the Coast (“WotC”). Much o…
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Part 3.5: A Mild Retraction That Makes Matters Worse for #WotC #DnD #copyright #iplaw #ogl

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 3.5 | FAQ/FRI Some excellent commentary on Part 3 from a reader uncovered an error and a weakness that deserve examination. Neither the error nor the weakness signif…
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 3.5 | FAQ/FRI In case it isn’t clear, Wizards of the Coast (“WotC”) does not endorse this post or any work I’ve created. My use of their trademarks is purely to iden…
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