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Post by hengest on Oct 9, 2019 18:40:15 GMT -5
Maybe if I get some material postable and post it, this thread (to which I may add) will go in that subforum...
Purely to get everything out in the open...
my preferences for a game I might run, or at least plan or hope to run...
—I am lazy. I don't want to have to process tons of numbers all the time.
—In addition to my laziness, I'm much more interested in flavor, feel, and world than I am in crunch.
—That said, I do like enough skeleton that the players can feel like they have SOME handle on what's possible, some idea of what their characters or NPCs can "do."
—I believe in the megadungeon, although I'm not sure it has to look like a megadungeon.
—I like to keep benefits reaped on the low side.
—I like it when I can imagine an adventure being enjoyed by people who "care" about characters or just want to interact with the game world through their PC avatars.
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Post by mao on Oct 9, 2019 19:45:34 GMT -5
Crunch bad
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Post by hengest on Oct 11, 2019 21:34:12 GMT -5
Note on problems with my imagination:
—I am so allergic to overdrawn settings and overpowered games that in response, I imagine nothing. A village with no residents and no treasure, then a continent of untouched forest in which it's impossible to even imagine a human presence. And there's nowhere to go from there.
—I have low tolerance for names in my own writing. Once I name a person or place, it feels like junk to me. But in the end I have to name them, and then it's hard to keep working.
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Post by mao on Oct 12, 2019 8:54:51 GMT -5
Note on problems with my imagination: —I am so allergic to overdrawn settings and overpowered games that in response, I imagine nothing. A village with no residents and no treasure, then a continent of untouched forest in which it's impossible to even imagine a human presence. And there's nowhere to go from there. —I have low tolerance for names in my own writing. Once I name a person or place, it feels like junk to me. But in the end I have to name them, and then it's hard to keep working. What you need to do is concentrate on your strong suit, which to me seems to look that you are extremely good w mood(and that's tuff for a lot of other peeps) Instead of making your own world, you might want to consider finding one that you can "pervert"(LOL). That being said you are selling yourself short. Your mood ability can be your overwhelming strength in a setting. You could name nothing, absolutely nothing, which could be very very spooky. AS always I am willing to help out anyone here, all you have to do is Another thing you could do is to run Call of Cthuhu or Ravenloft. |
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Post by hengest on Oct 12, 2019 14:38:18 GMT -5
Note on problems with my imagination: —I am so allergic to overdrawn settings and overpowered games that in response, I imagine nothing. A village with no residents and no treasure, then a continent of untouched forest in which it's impossible to even imagine a human presence. And there's nowhere to go from there. —I have low tolerance for names in my own writing. Once I name a person or place, it feels like junk to me. But in the end I have to name them, and then it's hard to keep working. What you need to do is concentrate on your strong suit, which to me seems to look that you are extremely good w mood(and that's tuff for a lot of other peeps) Instead of making your own world, you might want to consider finding one that you can "pervert"(LOL). That being said you are selling yourself short. Your mood ability can be your overwhelming strength in a setting. You could name nothing, absolutely nothing, which could be very very spooky. AS always I am willing to help out anyone here, all you have to do is Another thing you could do is to run Call of Cthuhu or Ravenloft. Thanks man. Appreciate it and the encouragement as I sketch out some thoughts in the other thread. I always assumed CoC and RL were not to my taste, but maybe I guessed wrong. I should take a look. |
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Post by mao on Oct 12, 2019 16:03:03 GMT -5
What you need to do is concentrate on your strong suit, which to me seems to look that you are extremely good w mood(and that's tuff for a lot of other peeps) Instead of making your own world, you might want to consider finding one that you can "pervert"(LOL). That being said you are selling yourself short. Your mood ability can be your overwhelming strength in a setting. You could name nothing, absolutely nothing, which could be very very spooky. AS always I am willing to help out anyone here, all you have to do is Another thing you could do is to run Call of Cthuhu or Ravenloft. Thanks man. Appreciate it and the ve(whch I dn,t know as I sketch out some thoughts in the other thread. I always assumed CoC and RL were not to my taste, but maybe I guessed wrong. I should take a look. The horror games are not to everyone's taste. You could go in a mystery direction instead but don't have a game to point you at. In which case you could look to Murder on the Orient Express or Hound of Baskervile This is all assuming that you are correct in the negative comments that you posted about yourself(which I have nothing to go on except your comments). It's very nice to see a new poster and i hope what ever you do, you do it here cause so far your mood element is off the charts. |
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Post by hengest on Oct 12, 2019 23:21:26 GMT -5
mao, I want to take you up on that offer of a sub for my work-threads, if you think it's ok and there's room. I have some other ideas, and would like to have them in one place. I can't guarantee I will post a ton of stuff all at once or anything like that, but I would like to have a few threads for working out thoughts and discussing them, if anyone wants to.
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Post by hengest on Oct 12, 2019 23:23:12 GMT -5
Thanks man. Appreciate it and the ve(whch I dn,t know as I sketch out some thoughts in the other thread. I always assumed CoC and RL were not to my taste, but maybe I guessed wrong. I should take a look. The horror games are not to everyone's taste. You could go in a mystery direction instead but don't have a game to point you at. In which case you could look to Murder on the Orient Express or Hound of Baskervile This is all assuming that you are correct in the negative comments that you posted about yourself(which I have nothing to go on except your comments). It's very nice to see a new poster and i hope what ever you do, you do it here cause so far your mood element is off the charts. And yeah, for all my love for D&D and D&Dalikes, I should get familiar with a couple other systems. I'm not so attached to crunch, I like rolling a d20 but I'm not too worried about it, but I guess I do like mood and suggestion and I should take a look at how that is handled elsewhere. |
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Post by El Borak on Oct 13, 2019 0:22:05 GMT -5
mao , I want to take you up on that offer of a sub for my work-threads, if you think it's ok and there's room. I have some other ideas, and would like to have them in one place. I can't guarantee I will post a ton of stuff all at once or anything like that, but I would like to have a few threads for working out thoughts and discussing them, if anyone wants to. Don't worry about room, proboards has plenty of room, there are forums on the same platform that we use that have over 1,000,000 posts and I think some that have over 10,000,000 so we essentially have unlimited room. All for having a few ads on the page at top and bottom.
Following these three links will help you navigate. Or you can just go straight to the 3rd link I gave you. Now at the 3rd link, just post the name you want for your forum and if you want a subforum(s) tell me the name(s) for it too.
Once I create your forum, it will be located in the section that you see when you click the fiirst link above. That is the section for active and/or notable campaign forums. There is no hard and fast rule about what is notable. We kind of play that by ear. If any of the inactive ones becomes active it will be moved to the main page again. Any questions just ask, we are here to help!
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Post by hengest on Oct 13, 2019 20:03:24 GMT -5
El Borak , Thank you for the help. Could I ask that this thread be moved to Evening Bell?
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Post by El Borak on Oct 13, 2019 23:02:44 GMT -5
El Borak , Thank you for the help. Could I ask that this thread be moved to Evening Bell? I moved that one and a couple of more. |
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Post by The Perilous Dreamer on Oct 15, 2019 8:45:03 GMT -5
The horror games are not to everyone's taste. You could go in a mystery direction instead but don't have a game to point you at. In which case you could look to Murder on the Orient Express or Hound of Baskervile This is all assuming that you are correct in the negative comments that you posted about yourself(which I have nothing to go on except your comments). It's very nice to see a new poster and i hope what ever you do, you do it here cause so far your mood element is off the charts. And yeah, for all my love for D&D and D&Dalikes, I should get familiar with a couple other systems. I'm not so attached to crunch, I like rolling a d20 but I'm not too worried about it, but I guess I do like mood and suggestion and I should take a look at how that is handled elsewhere. Yeah, mood is definitely your strong suit! |
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Post by hengest on Oct 16, 2019 9:53:20 GMT -5
You know, I read all kinds of DnD and OSR stuff online. People are creative and there's tons of cool material.
But I can tell that, while I might like to play a lot of it, I couldn't run it.
The "gonzo" kind of approach and experience...I just can't get a grip on it. I like it...but I couldn't ref it for others.
I feel like I would have to earn anything shocking or extreme that I might run.
I feel like a ruin or an abandoned or semi-abandoned place needs to feel plausible to me. Almost as something that could exist in the real world (allowing for differences). If you find something, that means someone left it there. I don't need explicit backstory, but it needs to feel plausible. Like a broken bottle behind a convenience store. Who knows how it got there? But it doesn't strain belief to say "Well, it got there somehow.". It doesn't seem like it was placed there for you.
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Post by mao on Oct 17, 2019 8:32:56 GMT -5
Gonzo is easy for me(but you guys already figured that out) and while I can do scary and mysterious, it's a lot harder for me. Everyone is different and has their own strengths and weaknesses. I like you have trouble w names and my game group was used to NPCs being labeled as "Shopkeeper" or "blacksmith". it always pays to know your abilities
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Post by hengest on Oct 17, 2019 9:25:54 GMT -5
Gonzo is easy for me(but you guys already figured that out) and while I can do scary and mysterious, it's a lot harder for me. Everyone is different and has their own strengths and weaknesses. I like you have trouble w names and my game group was used to NPCs being labeled as "Shopkeeper" or "blacksmith". it always pays to know your abilities I can make up names all day, but as soon as I apply one to a place or person, the whole thing just turns to junk for me. |
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Post by ripx187 on Oct 18, 2019 21:25:33 GMT -5
Gonzo is easy for me(but you guys already figured that out) and while I can do scary and mysterious, it's a lot harder for me. Everyone is different and has their own strengths and weaknesses. I like you have trouble w names and my game group was used to NPCs being labeled as "Shopkeeper" or "blacksmith". it always pays to know your abilities I can make up names all day, but as soon as I apply one to a place or person, the whole thing just turns to junk for me. Coming up with names is difficult. Coming up with names that players will remember? Even harder. For NPCs, their job is usually their name. That is because even if I craft a name for them, this is what the players are going to call them anyway so I say go for it. Creating good names, I use nicknames a lot. For instance, the big bad guy right now is a man known as, Ivan "The Mumbler". They won't remember Ivan, but they will remember Mumbler. It also is a prompt for his character. I name towns like this too. I want them to be a prompt, not just for the players, but for myself as well. |
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Post by mao on Oct 19, 2019 8:17:43 GMT -5
I can make up names all day, but as soon as I apply one to a place or person, the whole thing just turns to junk for me. Coming up with names is difficult. Coming up with names that players will remember? Even harder. For NPCs, their job is usually their name. That is because even if I craft a name for them, this is what the players are going to call them anyway so I say go for it. Creating good names, I use nicknames a lot. For instance, the big bad guy right now is a man known as, Ivan "The Mumbler". They won't remember Ivan, but they will remember Mumbler. It also is a prompt for his character. I name towns like this too. I want them to be a prompt, not just for the players, but for myself as well. I love this! Have an exault! |
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Post by hengest on Oct 19, 2019 22:12:22 GMT -5
This concussion has really done a number on me. I had hoped to sit up some these last few nights and at least do some thinking out loud, but I am not really able to.
In general, however, I'm trying to please myself with my attempts at setting material. Figure I may as well please someone...
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Post by mao on Oct 20, 2019 6:33:27 GMT -5
This concussion has really done a number on me. I had hoped to sit up some these last few nights and at least do some thinking out loud, but I am not really able to. In general, however, I'm trying to please myself with my attempts at setting material. Figure I may as well please someone... You have made a very important discovery here. You have to please yourslf, find what that is and then find ike minded gamers. In a lot of ways I run a combat game w a little RPing. My groupwas a fine tuned war machine, they had to be to survive. |
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Post by hengest on Oct 23, 2019 22:15:58 GMT -5
This concussion has really done a number on me. I had hoped to sit up some these last few nights and at least do some thinking out loud, but I am not really able to. In general, however, I'm trying to please myself with my attempts at setting material. Figure I may as well please someone... You have made a very important discovery here. You have to please yourslf, find what that is and then find ike minded gamers. In a lot of ways I run a combat game w a little RPing. My groupwas a fine tuned war machine, they had to be to survive. I gotta learn to run combat better. And, um, aerial combat while I'm at it... |
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Post by mao on Oct 25, 2019 6:09:27 GMT -5
You have made a very important discovery here. You have to please yourslf, find what that is and then find ike minded gamers. In a lot of ways I run a combat game w a little RPing. My groupwas a fine tuned war machine, they had to be to survive. I gotta learn to run combat better. And, um, aerial combat while I'm at it... Every once in a while (In my Mysantia game) I would have Dragon Mating Season and the good guys would break out the Pegasis and griffins and majic carpets lots and lots of fun |
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Post by hengest on Nov 5, 2019 15:05:32 GMT -5
In the interests of continuing to describe my "preferences," I will say that I am beginning to guess that I dislike combat and fear running it because I have never seen it done well (quick, engaging).
Regardless of edition, I think combat has always been a slog in my experience.
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Post by The Perilous Dreamer on Nov 5, 2019 22:08:46 GMT -5
IMO combat should move very quickly, so I do not use initiative and I run it all as simultaneous. I have always used 6 second melee rounds from when I started back in '75. I "encourage" my players to be quick and ready. We go around the room. In OD&D all weapons do a d6 plus weapon bonus if any. So the player can roll a d20 and a d6 together. If they hit the damage is already known and if they miss you ignore the damage roll. I tell them if they hit and subtract the damage from the opponent. I tell them if they were hit and I subtract any damage from the player, but they do not know how much. (I say something like drew a little blood or you really felt that one and it staggered you). On to the next one and you go around the room. Once the player get used to it, it moves very fast. Sometimes all I need to know is did either the PC or NPC roll a critical hit or critical failure.
When the players first get a magic weapon they will not know how good it is or is not. But once they have used it for a while, they know. I do not remind players to use their magic items, if they have something and they forget that is on them. I do remind rookies a few times, but the other players should be doing that.
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Post by The Semi-Retired Gamer on May 10, 2022 19:11:34 GMT -5
In my youth I dug crunch but that preference has definitely changed with time. AD&D was my go to game but now that I own the PHB & DMG again they are nostalgic relics for me. These days I want something a lot more simple and lower crunch. Until I get around to printing OD&D I prefer something like Delving Deeper.
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