Search results

What did Wittgenstein say about what ‘a game’ is?

Depends on the context. It means that players don't try to rest in situations that are somewhat implausible. It also means that wilderness travel flows better. Players don't blow their best spells if they don't know they will be able to regain them. It also puts a bit of time pressure on...

So cats that have demons in their ancestry. How would we tell them apart from normal cats?

If the Army of Militaristic Dwarves is invading the Orcish kingdom where the players live then they're going to deal with it. That's what the campaign is about because that's what you agreed in session 0. This doesn't mean there has to be a pre-determned plot. The players just react to what's...

People play halfllings. I know that you think around 1 in 20 characters is an unacceptably small number, but I don't see any reason to agree. What exact number is the cut-off? As I said earlier, if all PHB races are played equally (and only PHB races played) they would each be 11%. So...

Sounds good. But exchanging all those gold pieces into real currency would be a real faff. Not just me for me but for the players too. Wouldn't it just make more sense if they paid me in Australian dollars?

Well I agree. No core races. But I think it's very unlikely that 6e will have the same common/uncommon split. That's obviously a product of 5e post edition wars and its hyper-traditional approach. (13th Age released about a year earlier also made Tieflngs and Dragonborn 'optional'). But I'm...

So what is the issue? That new GMs might feel they need to use Halflings? Why aren't we similarly bothered about them feeling compelled to use Dwarves?

Well yes. But it also has to have gnomes and dwarves and elves. As I said earlier, I find halflings more malleable than dwarves and elves. If I had a player who really wanted to play a halfling I could fit them into anything with little trouble.

That's basically what I expected.

I think you are seriously underestimating people's willingness to accept thematic constraints on races. Look at the recent thread about human only games. The vast majority of responders were perfectly ok with a game that had NO non-human NPCs.

Birthright doesn't have gnomes. But it doesn't matter if all the 2e campaign settings are ancient now. Eberron has halflings but it has everything. Wasn't having everything part of the rules of the contest? I don't even know what you're trying to argue here. I thought you were arguing that...

No one's saying this. No one has to argue that they NOT forced, because no reasonable case has been made that they are. So all D&D settings have halflings except the the ones that don't? Ok I'll grant that. Other than the ones that are rehashes of old settings the only new setting that is...

If you do something to make Halflings cool and interesting in your games then you'd likely see more of them. But then of course, if no one is missing them, there's no real reason to do that either.

Works well. I've done pretty much exactly that. The only thing to consider is how this may influence short rests. If combats tend to be days apart then short rests tend to get taken for granted and certain abilities such as the Fighter's Second Wind become more powerful. You can account for...

By making choices. Funny voices are optional. I don't see how choices are. Exactly. Railroading tends to be experienced when choices are offered but are not meaningful. If you just told me a story about a bunch of adventurers and their hijinks there would be no railroad. Boredom possibly...

Huh? All I'm saying is that if you're doing what you're doing and everyone is happy then you might as well keep doing it and not worry about if you're sinning. I sure as hell wouldn't do it. To me seeing what unexpected things players do is the whole point of running a game.

If a halfling wears a Belt of Dwarvenkind is he now a gnome?

To be honest I don't think it's dismissive. I think it's basically just true by definition. Making choices is how you interact with the game. If you're not doing that how are you not an audience member?

It's all connected. Railroading often occurs because a DM tries to connect things with illusory choices., or because they have presented the players with choices they don't know how to follow up on.