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I don't think it's generally a good idea to try for technical readings of 5e based material... but, I can imagine a case where "actions" refers to the set of all actions, including bonus, free, reactions, etc, while "action" is narrowly defined.

I don't see any particular reason why not. It certainly sounds like more fun for the player.

While a fun and flavorful idea, isn't that pretty explicitly a Bard thing in 5.5, with that high level Words of Creation, Power Word Kill/Heal ability?

Yeah, this is my experience as well. I've found it easiest to go Stargate style. You're either speaking [standard language] or sometimes [secret language the players will eventually figure out]. Sometimes things are written in [ancient language] which no one speaks, but can be understood with...

Don't be afraid to put some stuff in reserve for the next book! No reason you can't be ahead on the next project.

I really don't think booster packs or random mini deserve any apology here. There is no pro-consumer reason to sell things that way. The secondary market is entirely a product of manufactured scarcity, the actual use value of the products is unchanged if the consumer knows what they are buying...

Netrunner has ruined me for most other card games. Trying to play Magic is very painful when you realize you're not just allowed to draw cards when you don't have an answer to the current board situation, or how little your opponent's board state matters to what cards you'll play. When talking...

That's a bit oversalting it, it's much more that WotC wrecked the commons created by the OGL, and doesn't seem particularly contrite about it. Putting the 5e SRD under a new license doesn't actually do anything for all the material made using the OGL in the last 20 years. I'd prefer some real...

I'd argue his most effective criticism of MtG was Netrunner. Personally, I think the biggest problem with EDH is that multiplayer free-for-all is a terrible basic idea for a conflict game structure, and immediately signs all the players up to either design their own metagame of largely unspoken...

Getting an adamantine dagger to break through walls was absolutely a 3e thing. Adamantine explicitly ignored hardness, which meant you could deal direct HP damage to any material, so you could chip your way through anything given enough time.

I'd love more games to treat gear as a preparation system. Deciding what to bring and then how to use it to overcome problems is one of the best places for player expression. The issue has usually been that gear is just entirely outclassed by other resources, so it's not worth engaging with as a...

I think the disconnect you're running into here is that Sanderson's appeal is primarily about setting. You're getting details about magic systems and political conflicts and social setups because that is the selling point. His characters, like his prose, tend to be serviceable rather than...

You've reminded me of Green Ronin's True Sorcery system, which I adored back in the day. It has a very comprehensive spell construction/modification system that allows for the creation of spell variants on the fly. Honestly, gives me misty-eyed nostalgia a little bit, because I just can't...

That conversation between Death and Susan is one of the most resonant things I've ever read. I can quote most of it from memory, and that particular conception of humanism has become a personal guiding principle.

We're like 6 quotes deep here, but I'm referring to @mamba's example, not the proposed skill challenge.

"Cheating" implies malice that I don't think should be attributed to the example here. Instead, the player is simply trying to declare an illegal action, like trying to move a rook diagonally. It's cheating if you attempt to do so covertly, it's a misplay to do so because of mistaken knowledge...

It's a whole other topic, but I think it's more salvageable than everyone says if you built more carefully for it from the ground up. The basic Saves/BAB/HP progression math isn't really the source of the problem, and it's pretty easy to quickly develop shorthand knowledge of those...

This is an interesting grey area. While acknowledging the player's input has an effect on the outcome, I don't generally think of players seeking more information or asking clarifying questions as establishing new information.

I largely agree, but one possible exception might be systems that use XP as an expendable resource, like 3e era magic item creation, though those obviously bring plenty of their own problems.

Notably, many game systems do advancement on a strict per session basis.