Unpopular opinions go here

[Jaeger]

More objectively true Salty epiphanies from my meditations:


I'm over making excuses for sloppy game design.

When you say that you have worked on a game for x number of years; Why must I still Un-Bork your system when it hits my table?

Too many of the industries established names make product with mechanical system issues that are spotted by the player base virtually on release.

And I am tired of pretending it's OK.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

More objectively true Salty epiphanies from my meditations:


I'm over making excuses for sloppy game design.

When you say that you have worked on a game for x number of years; Why must I still Un-Bork your system when it hits my table?

Too many of the industries established names make product with mechanical system issues that are spotted by the player base virtually on release.

And I am tired of pretending it's OK.

this isn't just a problem with TTRPGs, either. it's really a problem with nearly all media - films, video games, whatever - like sheesh, if it takes me 30 seconds to find a massive problem with your product, someone needs to be fired.

 

[Faolyn]

ok, i agree with you and everything, but i had to take the chance to say i really like your new PFP.

Thanks! It's a thing I drew that I ended up using as a cryptid for my Monster of the Week game. Sort of based on Mothman, but more owl-based.

 

[Faolyn]

Hold on. I6 has room after room of terrible pun names in the crypts.

You (and I) may not like that, but campy humor is 100% representative of the setting.

I know. And I hate it. If my introduction to Ravenloft had been through the original module, I would have never have gotten into the setting.

(I don't like forced humor in my SeRiOuS gAmEs.)

 

[overgeeked]

More objectively true Salty epiphanies from my meditations:


I'm over making excuses for sloppy game design.

When you say that you have worked on a game for x number of years; Why must I still Un-Bork your system when it hits my table?

Too many of the industries established names make product with mechanical system issues that are spotted by the player base virtually on release.

And I am tired of pretending it's OK.

this isn't just a problem with TTRPGs, either. it's really a problem with nearly all media - films, video games, whatever - like sheesh, if it takes me 30 seconds to find a massive problem with your product, someone needs to be fired.

That's where I am, basically.

At least it's more understandable in video games where you're talking about hundreds or thousands of hours of coding, writing, art, etc that all go into designing a video game. But with an RPG? It's literally words on a page. You mean you didn't have a single person outside the design team look at this thing and try to break it? Really? Not every game needs to be for every player, that's fine. But at least don't phone in the design.

 

[Gradine]

Are talking how U.S. numbered them or Japanese? So confusing.

Since every game has now been released in the West under its original numbering, the old-school U.S. numbering (FFII for FFIV, "the one with Cecil and Kain") (FFIII for FFVI, "the one with Kefka") is pretty much defunct.

 

[W'rkncacnter]

That's where I am, basically.

At least it's more understandable in video games where you're talking about hundreds or thousands of hours of coding, writing, art, etc that all go into designing a video game. But with an RPG? It's literally words on a page. You mean you didn't have a single person outside the design team look at this thing and try to break it? Really? Not every game needs to be for every player, that's fine. But at least don't phone in the design.

even with video games it gets dramatically less understandable when a small independent team with peanuts for funding that doesn't even meet the qualifications to properly be called a studio manages to dropkick your game in the face, like we've seen happen several times in recent years.

 

[overgeeked]

even with video games it gets dramatically less understandable when a small independent team with peanuts for funding that doesn't even meet the qualifications to properly be called a studio manages to dropkick your game in the face, like we've seen happen several times in recent years.

Yep. Small indie games that are absolutely wrecking AAA studios is an absolute joy to watch. I think that's mostly the passion to create a great game that does this one thing well vs the corpo mindset of must make the most profitable game possible.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Yep. Small indie games that are absolutely wrecking AAA studios is an absolute joy to watch. I think that's mostly the passion to create a great game that does this one thing well vs the corpo mindset of must make the most profitable game possible.

I feel that way about RPGs too.

 

[Lanefan]

I see where you're coming from. I do think anything published for an RPG should be useful to running an RPG. I don't really want a history book, I want setting information seeded with adventure ideas.

If a setting's history is done right it can be a gold mine for adventure ideas. But to be so it has to leave questions for the DM (or the players) to ask and then seek answers to - what became of the mad Emperor who suddenly abdicated 146 years ago? Was Abercrombie the lich really destroyed in the Kalt uprising of 1085 or is that just a cover-up? Has all worship of Bane really ended in the local realms? Etc.

There's yer vein of gold.

If you're going to flesh out Daggerfall on the Sword Coast of the Forgotten Realms, give me NPCs, geographic points of interest, organizations, and situations that I might incorporate into my game and use as I see fit.

And tell us how they got there, or at least leave us asking questions. Even something as basic as a geographic feature can do this: is the tower-like island just off the coast natural or artificial? Was it once connected to the mainland and if yes, what happened to the intervening bit of land? Does - or could - anything live on or in it? Is it just a cover for something else inside e.g. a space rocket? Etc.