• NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.

Recent content by Composer99

  1. Composer99

    [Backerkit] Midnight Muscadines, The Cozy-Dark TTRPG

    Gotta say, this looks pretty cool. Might be a good way to get some friends who aren't into D&D into RPGs.
  2. Composer99

    D&D (2024) Anyone else dislike the "keyword" style language of 5.24?

    This is simply false. The SRD is a tool for developers who are creating third-party content. I mean, you do you, but I find having to navigate through pictures, blog posts, and other content to get to a recipe to be infuriating. I thus cannot find the words to express my disagreement with the...
  3. Composer99

    D&D (2024) Anyone else dislike the "keyword" style language of 5.24?

    I'd prefer text formatting, such as bolding or underlining, over all the First Letter Caps, such as blinded instead of "the Blinded Condition", but as someone who writes and revises rules as part of their job, I'm overall pleased with the change. Maybe the PHB at least could have had fewer...
  4. Composer99

    Different philosophies concerning Rules Heavy and Rule Light RPGs.

    I read @Celebrim's statement on "fudging" with respect to PbtA-style games as referring to when a player character makes a Move and the result of the die roll requires the GM/facilitator to make some kind of Move in response, where what that looks like within the fiction are largely within the...
  5. Composer99

    D&D General People make amazing D&D Art

    Some beautiful work on this thread!
  6. Composer99

    Hot take: get rid of the "balanced party" paradigm

    I was planning on basically saying this exact thing, more or less. I would add that for a more tightly-focused game, it's well within the DM/GM's purview to state "this campaign requires a balanced party composition of synergistic specialists" or something to that effect. Either way, it seems...
  7. Composer99

    Playing in Person Is Just Better (for me)

    I definitely enjoy both, though I would like to play more frequently in person.
  8. Composer99

    D&D General A glimpse at WoTC's current view of Rule 0

    I would consider "level drain" as it is classically implemented to be extremely un-fun and will unequivocally refuse to play in a system that uses it. If the next time I'm DMing for my playgroup, they want me to run an OSR game (I have offered to run Dolmenwood), I will probably propose an...
  9. Composer99

    Twelve trees and green suns; refrences to a real world mythology?

    Water as a "recording medium" might also be a reference to the idea of "memory of water", which comes up in Frozen 2, for instance. I don't know what, it any, folkloric basis the idea has, but it is part and parcel, if memory serves, of the sympathetic-magic-turned-pseudoscience of homeopathy...
  10. Composer99

    Five Big Takeaways from the 2024 Dungeon Master's Guide

    Strong foundational DM/GM skills - that is to say, facilitating a game session that you and your players all came away from having had an engaging and enjoyable gameplay experience - are undoubtedly the most important thing any DM/GM can posssess. Each of the following DMs will run better games...
  11. Composer99

    D&D (2024) The New DM Tools In The New Dungeon Master's Guide

    I've read Adam Tooze's "The Wages of Destruction" cover to cover, for fun! So, like, high-density text isn't too much for me. The 2014 DMG is so sloppy, though, that I've yet to read it cover to cover. I use it as a reference but the layout and organisation is sufficiently irksome that I try not...
  12. Composer99

    Is There a Better Way to Illustrate Water on a Dungeon Map Than This?

    Rather than try to change the boundary, what if you just introduced some light shading or cross-hatch for the water?
  13. Composer99

    D&D 4E 4e-like game (title TBD)

    An update: I've got a prototype "module" for combat testing ready to go. All I need is to finish up some pregen characters and battle maps, and it'll be ready for testing. I think I'll put the playtest version up on itch.io for starters, set up a discord server for chat/feedback, and go from there.
  14. Composer99

    Graphic Design Layout Artists: The Reason TTRPGs Look Great

    Maybe it's cause I'm in my 40s, but put me down for greatly favouring either OSE/Dolmenwood or 4e-style layouts (in the pre-Essentials books; the layout in Essentials books is mostly subpar IMO) over either the 2014!5e "layout doesn't matter" style or the Vast Grimm artpunk style. I'd rather...
Top