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I noted something similar earlier about the tendency of modern heist/caper RPGs to include a mechanism for flashbacks that change the context of a problem, or happening to have equipment on you that was not specifically mentioned. Players can’t usually plan like an actual heist crew, and GMs...

This part of the conversation is with me, not Micah. And while Micah indeed does not like too much PC/NPC separation, even he has said that only some of his NPCs have the equivalent of class levels. What he seems to care about is that no ability is ultimately PC-only or NPC-only, not that every...

But the in-world reality isn’t “picks a feat, which everyone gets a choice of at adulthood.” That’s how the ability is gated for PCs. It is not a necessary consequence of that rule that any particular percentage of NPCs have acquired that exact mix of learned abilities, nor does it say anything...

5e NPCs aren’t built with PC rules and don’t take feats, though. Eberron assumes yes, regular people learn appropriate cantrips and low-level spells along with mundane training for their professions. Greyhawk probably doesn’t. OTOH, Eberron even in 3e held that PC classes are extraordinary...

No. Spending a Fate point gives you a +2 or a reroll. They are not “just declare whatever you want” points. Fate does have other mechanisms that allow the creation of new truths (aspects) about a scene or character … but in most cases that happens because of an in-character action that sets up...

What game or games are you talking about? It would basically have to be “improv governed solely by a metacurrency” to work like that, and no RPG systems I am aware of use metacurrency like that. Maybe Robin Laws’ DramaSystem? But how many games of that have you witnessed? Even in systems where...

Darem doesn’t turn into metal, he shows his true Khionian form as a fishlike alien. Hence the “fishstick” nickname/insult in a later episode. Though after episode 6, it would seem Darem isn’t just disguising himself, but that all Khionians have a very humanlike form they use outside of water...

They do lampshade that Holly’s age appears to have gotten a bit of a jump when Karen claims that Ted doesn’t even know how old she is. Love the actress, but weird that they recast and still went older than the character should be. Can’t really help it with the twentysomething teens by this...

Ohhhhh. Then I was the ignorant one. Funny, though, that the slang landed on “100,” when any of those other numbers would seem more fitting.

A ton is an actual unit of weight equal to 2000 pounds. The term is also used by extension for a large amount of anything, but I have never in my life heard it as specifically 100 of something. Most definitely not pounds.

I think that’s the one that had monks in preppy alligator shirts, so there was some zaniness.

I loved the Missing Dragons breath weapons because they were mixes/unmixes of the parent dragons’ breath weapons. The yellow breathes salt so that when the blue’s lightning breaks it down, their child the green has chlorine breath. The orange likewise has the yellow’s NaCl broken down by red’s...

That is indeed how Haste and Slow work in the PF2e three-action economy the kids are probably riffing on. Multi-attack abilities are usually something like “use two of your things to make three attacks” or “use all of your things to make one attack against each foe in reach/range.”

THRUSH and UNCLE got a pair of articles in issue 75.

Top Secret did get a major revised (really, completely different) edition in the late 80s in the form of Top Secret/S.I., in between the two Merle Rasmussen editions. S.I. was well supported for a few years, including pulp and superhero supplements. But maybe you consider that a distinct game...

Heck, “committing yourself to the game fiction’s own internal logic and causality” is what the old Pure Simulationist GMs from Usenet described themselves as doing, even though the GM is making many of the decisions (though perhaps also leaving some to randomizers). I think (correct me if I’m...

I do think that both Tolkien and Gygax (much as the latter might not care for the comparison) pushed their elves a bit away from being humans in cosplay by having them be spiritually and theologically distinct. Like, yeah, they’re people you can interact with, in a much more “their country is...

Yes, but hawkeyefan was specifically talking about improvements in presentation, organization, etc., as things that are generally better in newer games, even if they are re-presenting older rules (as with OSE vis-a-vis B/X). He specifically didn’t propose that mechanics had gotten better or...

Heck, James Bond 007, pointed to by some as the origin of metacurrency points (though there are earlier examples) had “add something to the scene” as one option for spending Hero Points.

Yeah, I honestly thought they were already calling themselves White Wolf.