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Session #71: Mouse droid bomb; children die

Yep. I hear you. I have seen this sort of thing before too. "Stealth": An entire party casts invisibility on everyone and then claims it can move in perfect silence for hours with drawn bladed weapons while maintaining perfect distance and no hilarity ensuing. "Negotiation": "I roll to...

@Theory of Games I always base leveling and attributes of a character in fiction based on what they actually are observed to do, not on the "aura" around them. Of course, since the fiction writer wasn't making the scenario to be 100% congruent to a set of game rules, and since neither the...

On "Die Hard" as D&D scenario: John McClane is above gritty tier and in the low end action movie hero tier. He's about 6th level character, probably Fighter/Rogue with 18 DEX (or you could stat him up in D20 Modern) and pretty decent CON (16?) and all-around good attributes. He has a few...

The guards are roughly 2nd level fighters with 12/12/12/8/8/8 ability scores, armed with a combination of light lances, broad swords, scimitars, composite shortbows and light and heavy crossbows, and wearing ringmail and carrying small shields. Some are on light warhorses to act as outriders...

"My Life with Master" is on the short list of con events I actually would want to do. Although, I'm increasingly disappointed at the level of GMing in con events and a bit sour on the whole thing now. Maybe 1 in 3 meet the standard of what I would consider an average GM, and maybe 1 in 10 are...

I differ I think from most tables in using absolutely the same rules for PCs and NPCs. So a 7 hp gobin dies in my game at -9hp (because of size class) and is in the same "dying" state as a PC would if reduced to -1. (Reduced to 0 you are always "staggered" and potentially "unconscious" but...

My take on this is that the implication is that an owlbear or other common to the "realm" predator doesn't stand a much of a chance against 12 caravan guards, and consequently hungry owlbears don't generally try to snack on groups of humanoids in broad daylight. One of the general rules I have...

You definitely could, though 3e's more granular "to hit" mechanism and lack of boundness means it's not as much of a problem, since at maximum range you are dealing with like -18 to hit, a bigger realism problem is probably the relatively high number of hits an unskilled archer would get from...

$60 in 2018 is worth like $30-$40 today depending on the numbers you trust. $70 today is like $35-$48 in 2018, again depending on the numbers you trust. I'm surprised they can sell it so low given what's happened in the last 7 years. $80 to $90 dollars would be totally fair given the...

I wish I could give this 100 thumbs up. As someone who loved 3.0e and had it immediately rekindle my love of D&D, I despised 3.5e. I don't think people are really cognizant of how much was changed for the worse in the design and practices of 3.5e because they superficially seem compatible. In...

What I prefer is that the rules don't describe a complex piece of software that is apparently intended to run on wetware, yet the rules be broad enough that they don't radically fail in (too many or commonly occurring) edge cases. Ideally they should also be somewhat fun. How you obtain that...

Generally agreed, although it depends on the NPC. A fourth level commoner or even a fourth level mercenary captain might and probably does have lower overall attribute scores and breadth to their skills than a typical PC. The PC is special only in the way that the brightest kid in the class is...

A fourth level character is "just better" than "other people" in the sense of surviving combat. Maybe the universe likes them better. Maybe they have uncanny luck. Maybe they have subtle magical powers. Maybe they are just so skilled at combat they seem to the observer nigh supernatural. It...

Basically how I play it and I believe that is the most accurate reading of Gygax's original explanation regarding the logic of hit points. It's that scene in Gladiator where Maximum lets the Praetorian put a sword to his neck. If he's a low-level character, he's dead. But he's Maximus...

Sure. Almost my whole participation in this thread is saying the same thing.

Yeah, but in real life you aren't a hero. You're another one-hit die creature trying to survive the surprise round, often unarmed. If you were in full SCA combat gear with a sharp weapon and not surprised, my guess is the typical knife wielder would very quickly get terrified of you.

Some notes on the characters: Class abbreviations are for 3rd edition. Com = Commoner, Exp = Expert, War = Warrior (not Warlock!). The rest are probably pretty easy to work out. I don't know what the proper way to stat these classes in another edition, but I would presume you could do them...

#37 Earcanwald the Rope Maker: Human Exp3 Squire Earcanwald owns several dozen acres under hemp and flax cultivation, and has a successful rope walk with several hirelings in addition to the help of his older children and sometimes his grandchildren. He is forty-eight years old, with thinning...

#31 Huggins Mudtoes the Fishmonger: Gnome Exp4 Huggins “Mudtoes” the fishmonger lives some miles out of town at the confluence of the main river and a small tributary. There he fishes for a living, bringing his catch (and those of any neighbors wishing to sell fish) in as soon as the gates...