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  1. Umbran

    D&D General This Makes No Sense: Re-Examining the 1e Bard

    And from this, we might learn that while it might be important, design isn't everything.
  2. Umbran

    Acquisitions Inc. switching to Daggerheart

    Hey. Uncool. You are vigorously antagonizing when someone indicates to you that you are coming on too strong, and you don't back off. So, back off already.
  3. Umbran

    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    Sure. But it then follows that simply stating your preference will not really inform others of your thinking.
  4. Umbran

    D&D General This Makes No Sense: Re-Examining the 1e Bard

    By that logic, we should never have bought rulebooks, because using rules at all is letting others make decisions for us.
  5. Umbran

    D&D General This Makes No Sense: Re-Examining the 1e Bard

    Because Gygax, et al. weren't particularly good technical writers. Remember, the need to say thing in particular ways so they'd be understood is something that game writers learned over time. How to write a game did not leap into being fully formed from Gygax's left elbow, or something.
  6. Umbran

    Different philosophies concerning Rules Heavy and Rule Light RPGs.

    Yes, I was speaking to US copyright.
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    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    In the Homeric poems, Zeus also guides fate, weighing Hector vs Achilles, and so on. It isn't like any of the old mythological systems are of clean canon or even self- consistent. They are stories people told across centuries, and change with the goals of the people telling them.
  8. Umbran

    Different philosophies concerning Rules Heavy and Rule Light RPGs.

    So, just to note: Copyright applies to specific expressions, not to "ideas". Moreover, copyright does not apply to systems, processes, or rules themselves - only to a specific expression of them. Thus, yes, designers use each other's ideas all the time. This summer, I played a one-shot of...
  9. Umbran

    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    There are stories and traditions in which the Greek Fates could be placated - for that to have meaning, they must have some influence on how things turn out. For example, we can look at the story of Meleager - the Fates might decree at your birth that your life will end when a particular log in...
  10. Umbran

    D&D General Why do good monsters exist, from a game design standpoint?

    Hey, can we not tell others how they think, please and thanks.
  11. Umbran

    D&D General Why do good monsters exist, from a game design standpoint?

    "Alignment" as you reference it here, doesn't have a significant mechanical impact in the modern game. Thus: from a mechanical standpoint, they don't serve a purpose, because alignment itself no longer serves a mechanical purpose. But, since the drift into mechanical irrelevance involved only...
  12. Umbran

    Describe your last rpg session in 5 words

    Hollow West, characters Session Zero
  13. Umbran

    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    Other than The Fates, of course.... And a goddess of luck in Tyche... And a goddess of chaos in Eris... And a god of prophecy in Apollo...
  14. Umbran

    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    "Given them an inch, and they'll take a yard." Unfortunately it ends up as, "I am a deity, great and powerful... but need a spam-blocker on my prayer line!" Actually, it sounds to me more like using an in-fiction justification to handle an out-of-fiction issue: The in-fiction gods police use...
  15. Umbran

    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    Maybe this was brought up before and I missed it... This was talking about the Commune spell, right? The spell whose description starts with, "You contact a deity or a divine proxy and ask up to three questions ..." So, I guess, never mind that the spell description has a solution for this -...
  16. Umbran

    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    Your deities are limited by something so basic as rate limits of linear time, and how many cognitive threads they can manage at once?
  17. Umbran

    D&D General Why do people like Alignment?

    Mod Note: Hey, ER? You've had your posts reported over a dozen times since August 1st, for various forms of being rude. Three times today alone. Whether or not any individual post was worthy of moderation, in aggregate, this is becoming a real problem. It is past time for that rate to drop...
  18. Umbran

    D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

    Yeah, it is. I mean, assuming we are considering behaviors that are actually about how a game is run, and not about personal hygiene, committing felonies, personal assault or harassment, or the like. Not really. Then it is behavior that one player does not like. Other players may not mind...
  19. Umbran

    D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

    Given that "bad" is a subjective human assessment, and that we therefore don't all share the same idea of who should be called, "bad," then what percentage of GMs "are bad" is not a thing. There is only what percentage some specific person or people would call bad. The threat of being called...
  20. Umbran

    D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

    It isn't about academically accurate language. It is about using language that suggests a point is backed with greater weight or authority than it deserves. The first time I tried to run a game was, I admit, a complete and utter failure. As in, I could not get the group through the first...
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