Search results

  1. Celebrim

    Five Takeaways From the 2025 Monster Manual

    Probably because no one has ever latched onto Goblins as representing a particular real world ethnic group. This is the Klingon problem. In Star Trek, the Klingons evolved over time from being simplistic orcs that reveled in being deceitful tricky backstabbing monsters, fulfilling the role...
  2. Celebrim

    Five Takeaways From the 2025 Monster Manual

    Wow. ",,,it radically changes the dynamics of many D&D combats." I'll say. It's probably the biggest change in D&D mechanics in the history of the game. What it does is radically minimize the value of having good saving throws. We're now fully at, "The best block; no be there." The game...
  3. Celebrim

    WotC Would you buy WotC products produced or enhanced with AI?

    I'm unlikely to buy WotC products at all, but using AI in their content given the current poor quality of content from AI would be a red flag to me that they aren't a top tier publisher anymore. On the other hand, if it's just one guy in his basement, then AI art probably isn't a red flag to...
  4. Celebrim

    D&D General What races/species populate your DnD world?

    Free People (Preapproved PC Races) ------------------------- Sidhe, Pixie, Changling Goblin, Hobgoblin Elf Human, Half-Elf, Half-Goblin Dwarf Orine (homebrew) Idreth (homebrew) Either free peoples or close kin by not generally playable for balance or gameplay reasons. Could be PCs if the...
  5. Celebrim

    AD&D 2E 2E Thief Rewrite

    I've played around with converting AD&D over to something more modern. What I had looked a lot like what you are doing but I also redid all saving throws to ensure more balance between the classes especially at high levels. I also gave the thief the same attack table as the cleric and also...
  6. Celebrim

    Describe your last rpg session in 5 words

    Investigation profitless; scouting speech site
  7. Celebrim

    D&D General Which edition handled alignment best?

    "Defined" or "Handled"? 1e AD&D has the least incoherent description of alignment, but its handling of alignment where everything is a hard punish soured people on it. I don't think there has been a perfect implementation of alignment, but I tend to favor 3e in almost all regards.
  8. Celebrim

    How Would Your Favorite Game System Handle This?

    I mean, it wouldn't. I don't know of a game that can handle this well. Some of them foresee the problem and try to head it off at the pass, but there isn't a way to handle the actual situation well given the limitations of the GM as a simulator. I try to avoid these sorts of situations the...
  9. Celebrim

    D&D 3.x 3.5e/PF/OGL Low-Magic Campaign Resources and Ideas

    @earthsea_wizard: Treating this like a single axis slider that just can be moved around and scaled is the mistake. Based on the descriptions that they give, my homebrew world is both high magic and low magic at the same time. I think the section just over simplifies the complex topics involved...
  10. Celebrim

    D&D General Ships & spellcasters

    Played this campaign back in the 1990s. It becomes necessary to assume that the production of sailcloth warded from fire is profitable and major industry. I presume the existence of a low level (3rd level or below) 'Ward Against Elements' spell that targets objects, is permanent, and has costs...
  11. Celebrim

    Will AI replace Dungeon Masters?

    The problem with my experience is in how it scans back through the context to find the relevant information. It seems to be optimized to reference the most recent plausible context out of the sea of past interactions using relatively simple pattern matching (take context from areas with...
  12. Celebrim

    Will AI replace Dungeon Masters?

    Yes. The problem is current generation AI has no memory and the way it fakes memory is highly unreliable. So the problem with playing a game of any sort with a large language model whether it's chess or an RPG is that very quickly the AI loses track of the game state or even that it is a game...
  13. Celebrim

    D&D General Languages suck in D&D.

    That would also require that there is a regional common tongue or that at least one PC (presumably the one that is "the face") also has the role of translator. But this just further silos social encounters toward a single PC. My biggest problem is that NPCs that the party can't communicate...
  14. Celebrim

    What Does Your Dream VTT Do/Look Like?

    I tried to get into a VTT but they all seemed overly complex with UI that seemed deliberately designed to make homebrew difficult. It was so much work trying to figure out how to use them that I considered for while that it might be easier to write my own. They seem designed mostly to provide...
  15. Celebrim

    Is There Possibility of a PF1.5 or a 3.5 Revival? Whether Directly or Something With Similar 'Ethos'

    I read this joke as mocking people who take guidelines as rules.
  16. Celebrim

    Is There Possibility of a PF1.5 or a 3.5 Revival? Whether Directly or Something With Similar 'Ethos'

    Definitely this could be a problem if you weren't careful as a DM. It is particularly a problem for DMs whose adventure/encounter design focuses entirely on humanoid enemies. Honestly, this could probably be a problem in 1e AD&D as well if you ran your games that way and you loaded NPCs down...
  17. Celebrim

    Is There Possibility of a PF1.5 or a 3.5 Revival? Whether Directly or Something With Similar 'Ethos'

    Well, that part of the system I didn't mind. First of all, it is necessary to balance magical item crafting. If all items are available to the player, there has to be a considerable cost to crafting the more desirable ones. And secondly, players in my experience love loot, and when dropping...
  18. Celebrim

    Choosing a new campaign

    This is the only 5e product that I bought because it impressed me so much, and I'd really love a review of how it played.
  19. Celebrim

    Is There Possibility of a PF1.5 or a 3.5 Revival? Whether Directly or Something With Similar 'Ethos'

    This I'm not entirely certain about because I only once and for a short period have a player who played a crafter. Aside from some scroll creation, most of my players characters in the campaign I ran the longest didn't invest in item creation feats. But, I consider 3e item creation feats very...
  20. Celebrim

    Unbelievable Scale of AI’s Pirated-Books Problem

    Were the books bought and paid for? Sounds like they weren't. I personally have no problem with using a legal copy of a book to train an AI as the assumption that it's basically no different than a human reader. So long as you only store the book in a non-representative form, I'm OK with...
Top