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Remember the evolution analogy. The key with incremental changes is not that they can’t lead to a large departure in the end, but that you never have so many of them at once that there’s a clean break. BX 2023 probably looks nothing like, and is incompatible with, its distant ancestor BX 1981...

Aren’t some spells phrased like that as well? I read it as “When you use this maneuver, you take an Attack (or whatever) action,” as in “the action that the maneuver uses is also an Attack action with these parameters.” You could also read it as “The maneuver takes an action but then gives you...

While the word "divine" is connected to languages associated with Christianity, and a lot of the study on the subject has been done by Westerners brought up in a Christianish milieu, I'm pretty sure the concept of the divine/holy/sacred/numinous is not specific to Christianity or even monotheism.

Heck, the 4e "investiture/ordination" narrative is how Catholic priests (undoubtedly among the most familiar real-world clerics to Western gamers) are understood to work in real life. Now, of course, their "superpowers" are sufficiently subtle that non-Catholics quite reasonably don't think they...

Or, perhaps, to allow for easier creation of stories of subversion, internecine strife, or just clerics going off and starting their own sect without the god immediately revoking powers. Or, heck, within a PC, the real-world drama of a priest who doubts or sins or starts thinking about the...

That can vary by setting. "Anthropomorphic gods that are very much like big people" is one option. "The universe" is another. "One or more pools of divine energy that believers tap into" (but whether they are sapient is a matter of belief) "The power of collective belief." "The words...

I think he means "spirit of war" in the sense of "Christmas spirit" (and not the Dickens kind) -- not just a slightly different form of conscious supernatural entity, but the impersonal concept of war itself.

I love the DCC/OSE stat-paragraph-thing for inclusion in a module or other writeup (i.e., for use at the table), but also love extra bits and bobs like signs of presence, behavior tables, monster knowledge difficulties, and variant monsters in a full monster book. I do regret that recent...

Sure, that's a terrible idea even for books with magic systems in them. But people in this thread seem to be operating on different levels of "make sense." I don't understand how the cleric class mechanical chassis only "makes sense" as an agent of the gods. Heck, the 5e SF hack Esper Genesis...

If they are not, that should be intentional and made clear in the rulebooks, so that something like 3rd edition "tier-limited" parties can happen from the first rather than have to be a fan add-on. If the impression given, if not the outright statement, is that you can contribute equally (if...

Even by pure ANH, Luke’s dad (even before he turned out to be Vader) was an active Jedi Knight, fought in the Clone Wars, and conceived Luke before he died. Though, as pointed out elsewhere, those things didn’t have to happen as close together as they wound up being depicted in the prequels.

On knowledge of the Force, the Jedi, etc.: In the original trilogy, Luke has heard of the Clone Wars and maybe knows that Jedi Knights fought in them (he initially denies that his father could have been one, but doesn‘t ask what they are). He does ask what the Force is, doesn’t seem to...

Note that 4e encounter powers and dailies (the source of that terminology in the D&D lineage) actually were short/extended rest recovery, with short enough short rests that you were assumed to do one after every fight. And while I misinterpreted Basic D&D's per-day spells as "they literally...

Whether they withheld information surely depends on when they made this decision. At one point they seemed to honestly believe they could just swap out licenses and PF2 would be fine. Then it may have occurred to them that, while the core mechanics are likely safe, things like specific spells...

Heh. The culture shock would be hilarious, though one could also play up the personal tragedy. Any other friends or siblings who didn't go to the amusement park with the gang would be middle-aged, possibly with teenagers of their own. Parents would be elderly or even dead. And of course, the...

Then one hopes they also return to the 80s, shortly after they left, not forty years later.

It amused me that during the whole “moviegoers are heroes” thing, Sophia Lillis and Justice Smith are just smiling uncomfortably and not saying anything. Obviously they just had a bigger main cast than the bit was scripted for, but I like to imagine them being lIke, “Okay, I’ll sit there, but...

Yeah, but Starfinder goes further than even most D&D derivatives in that area. Even the normal weapon lists are leveled, with different science-fictional adjectives indicating more advanced forms of people-hittin‘ hammers and whatnot. It’s odd even by D&D standards.

Yeah, but THOSE publishers can easily release under the ORC or another, non-WotC license, since WotC only cares about clamping down on D&D IP. Having to do so is an annoyance, but not nearly the problem that the "de-authorization" is for D&D 3PPs.

People have recreated pre-3e editions, which had no SRDs, from the 3.5 SRD under the OGL. While there are changes, OneD&D, from what we've seen so far, isn't so big a change from 5e-2014 as to make that impossible. Enough of the core of D&D is now available for anyone to work with that they...