Previously, in Trip's Life...
31 January 2010 - Sunday
Gaming: Playing NPCs is hard, especially during a
fight. There's all this dialogue and personality and stuff. Also,
many enemies should probably run away when they're bloodied, but that
makes the fight only half as hard, so I'd have to halve the XP. Maybe I
should give all the monsters twice the hit points instead...
Dave is pretty optimizatory, but I'm pretty sure character classes from PHB2
are just plain better in all ways than classes from PHB1. But PHB3 is
out soon, so all those PHB2 classes will get theirs!
Wire squares to show the location of movable zones work well.
Features of the battlefield that can be manipulated by PCs and
monsters are fun, but need to be well-placed. Features that should be
added to the field during the battle don't seem to ever get added.
(Monster leader auras also never get applied, bah.)
GMing is hard, let's play
SAngband.
Visual Entertainments: Finished the second disc of
Aquarion. I think the third disc is already on its way, but
I may not bother after that.
Cats:
Twelve paws!
Writing: Double check.
Just use more enemies by Graydon (Tue Feb 2 17:17:26 2010)
The first, bloodied, oh-gods-they-have-levels group of enemies flees; the second group of enemies figures, hey, those other suckers absorbed lots of spells, I bet we can take them.
This is good for adjusting encounters to avoid corpse-piling the party (you don't have to have the second group attack) and it's also a great way to keep the party deeply uncertain what they are fighting or what it might do next.
Graydon by Jeremy (Tue Feb 2 19:40:25 2010)
Stop listening to Graydon. He's a bad, bad influence.
Re: Just use more enemies by Trip (Wed Feb 3 12:48:22 2010)
It's no problem having enemies confident when they enter the fight ("We heard these guys was tough, but it was kobolds telling us that!"), but when they're all down half their HP and none of the PCs are, staying in the fight becomes less plausible for most encounters. Maybe I just need to send in more zombies and killer robots.
not really a bad influence by Graydon (Wed Feb 3 15:03:01 2010)
even if they only let me run Paranoia once.
Trip, the point is to set things up so the groups are not connected.
Group A is, I don't know, giant weasels; the weasels make a simple predation play, go for anyone physically small, try to drag away the wounded. Generally get the party a bit physically spread out, but eventually start just plain fleeing as the "I don't care if these are giant animals; they're annoying me" spell casting and heavy magic items get used.
Group B has no connection to the weasels beyond knowing that they're there.
So you get either a ghast just bright enough to grab one damaged and isolated party member and hide again, or you get a disciplined band of orcs who figure, hurm, if we all throw javelins at the casters (from behind this concealed pit) as our first action, we can maybe pull this off, or you get a territorial edge effect; Group A does a runner because the thing that lives here has been woken up and it's much better if the party deals with it.
(Oh, yeah -- once the party gets really stuck into the big fight? you want the equivalent of a buffalo stampede, right through the battlefield. Keeps things interesting.)
Re: not really a bad influence by Trip (Wed Feb 3 16:56:45 2010)
In D&D, it could be a dinosaur stampede!
I think you may be solving a more interesting problem than the one I have, which is just that it seems wrong to give full XP for a monster that scarpers after losing half its hit points (that is, after providing challenge/entertainment for only about half the time it could if it fought to the death). Having twice as many monsters but only giving half XP for each one because it only fights to half its capacity would certainly do the trick, as would silently doubling the hit points of each monster so they fight for all their real hit points before running away.
Or, of course, I could break free of the tyranny of experience points and just let the PCs level up whenever it seems dramatically appropriate.
if they only half win... by Graydon (Wed Feb 3 18:22:38 2010)
It's been... Thor and the White Christ, more than 20 years since I played D&D, and more than 10 now since I was running a RuneQuest game, so I'm likely wretchedly out of date, but I did always like RuneQuest's "did you use that skill?" approach to experience.
That said, I'd say you get one quarter XP for holding the field after the opponent flees.
I'd also say you need to make sure that the players don't know they can take this opponent. So it's important that the challenges range from "easy" through "never in this life" with a median around "even match".
I think it's also important that experience derive mostly from doing better than expected, so winning a straight-up even fight with everybody on single digit hit points and no spells is worth maybe half the standard XP rating; winning with only minor HP loss by one party member rates the full XP award.
This moves things from a ticky-list of corpses into "was there grace and elegance involved in producing the corpse?"
I'd say you get full XP for solving problems through trickery, bribery, or diplomacy, too. If you use diplomacy on the dinosaur stampede, extra bonus XP may be warranted. :)
Death to grinding by Carl (Thu Feb 4 05:11:33 2010)
Did 4e move away from "XP for defeating the monster" back to the bad old days of "XP only for killing things?" There's no need to grind out combats past the fun part; if you want to have things run away when they're bloodied (and the PCs are not) and the outcome is obvious and still award full XP, it's not like WotC will parachute elite ninja assassins to make you pay for your crimes against the laws of god and man!
Or, as you contemplate, skip the XP and just level the PCs up when it pleases you and the players to do so.
One of the things I liked a lot about Gretchen's Khem setting for D&D was that it had ransom, so you could get rewarded for capturing things and ransoming them, and likewise PCs could be captured instead of killed, so fights weren't always a bitter struggle to the death. I liked that much better than D&D's default "it's ok to kill evil things because they're not really people" which has unpleasant mental resonances for me. But others milage may vary!
An aspect of ransom in Glorantha that I liked a lot was everyone calling out their ransom as they entered battle, so the tougher opponents knew who to head for first.
Re: Death to grinding by Trip (Thu Feb 4 14:52:27 2010)
I'm not sure I believe you about the lack of ninjas. Giving full XP for only half the fighting is a lot like letting the players get away with something, and we can't have that!
XP is definitely awarded for defeating an encounter regardless of bloodshed (but not for avoiding it altogether), and there are also awards for noncombat encounters (skill challenges) and quests.
Ransom would have been good to institute in the first place, although maybe I can do it now that the PCs are travelling to a new area with strange customs. Let's see... gaining a level solely by defeating monsters, for the standard party of five PCs, would mean fighting 50 monsters of their level. If we set the total ransom for those 50 as equal to the monetary treasure that should be given out over that level, that comes to 4% of the value of a magic item of that level per monster. (In practice, some of that XP will come from quests, skill challenges, or un-ransomable monsters, so there would still be some random piles of cash in the level's treasure awards.)
A fight with equal-level monsters where the PCs are outnumbered 2:1 is very hard (level+4) but winnable, so a PC's ransom should probably be a little more than twice that for a monster of the same level, so call it 10% of a magic item of that level, or 5% of the money the party should rake in over the level. Having to ransom the whole party would then cost a quarter of the expected money from that level, which seems reasonable. Of course, they'd have to become part of society to the extent that someone would pay ransom for them, but they can probably put cash in escrow with someone instead of having to find a patron. The cash might even still be there when they need it!
This makes shouting out your ransom equivalent to shouting out your level, but that's probably fine for D&D.
Make a comment!
30 January 2010 - Saturday
Gaming: Oh yah, I guess I should write up something
for tomorrow, huh?
Scanning in monster stat blocks and then printing them out is less
horrible than two rounds of photocopying with scissors between, although
it was surprisingly annoying figuring out how to stick a few images into
one image. I finally used OmniGraffle, although that's really not what
it's for.
Textual Entertainments: Darkship
Thieves (Sarah A Hoyt) is sadly neither particularly good nor
particularly original.
Visual Entertainments: Started the second disc of
Aquarion. Oh no, it's the Shining Dodecahedron! Lose SAN!
Cats:
Twelve paws!
Writing: FAIL.
Make a comment!
29 January 2010 - Friday
Work: Phone calls successfully conducted: 1. Phone
calls arranged for Monday: 2.
My, the Internet really is full of things:
Rocks!
Cats:
Twelve paws of extra scampering!
Writing: Check.
My, the Internet really is full of things by marith (Sun Jan 31 17:55:23 2010)
Invisible things! :)
Pish! by Trip (Sun Jan 31 21:25:31 2010)
And also Tosh!
Make a comment!
28 January 2010 - Thursday
HAPPY HAPPY EARL-DAY!!
Work: Phone calls successfully conducted: 0. (Next
time for sure!) Interviews successfully conducted: 1. At least I made it
to the end this time!
Food: Marith and I went to
Lavanda
with Cat and Earl for Earl's birthday dinner. Things eaten include, but
are not limited to" bacon-wrapped dates, blood orange slices in honey
and stuff, charred squid, beet salad, pork tenderloin, red cabbage with
apple, butternut squash with mascarpone, vinegar-marinated beef,
geometric pasta, panna cotta, and chocolate lava cake.
Cats:
Twelve fuzzy paws!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
27 January 2010 - Wednesday
Work: Phone calls arranged for tomorrow: 1. Interviews arranged for tomorrow: 1.
Upgrades: At long last the new balcony sliding door
has been installed, and I can actually separate the inside air from the
outside air!
Visual Entertainments: Finished first disc of
Aquarion. It is very much of the animation style that it
is.
Cats:
Twelve very oppressed paws!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
26 January 2010 - Tuesday
Work: FAIL. Sick. No brain.
Visual Entertainments:
- Oh! Edo Rocket 18-19: Not even Dave expected that!
- Tokyo Marble Chocolate 1-2: I don't know what that
creature was, but it was Not Of This Earth. That doesn't excuse putting
it in a box, though.
- Avatar 17: Best. Play. Ever. (In other news, Toph still
rules.)
- Darker Than Black 15: This can't possibly end well.
Starting next week, Spice and Wolf second season!
Cats:
I have been hearing tiny high-pitched squeaks from the direction of the
next room, which I think might be Aspen serenading Marmalade in his
Linen Closet of Solitude! I can't be sure, though, because Aspen clams
up whenever I get too close. Also, there's an open balcony door between
us so I might be hearing something from outside. But it might
be Aspen being cute!
Writing: FAIL. See above.
Make a comment!
25 January 2010 - Monday
Work: Interviews conducted today: ½.
<lining style="Ag">At least they didn't leave me
hanging!</lining>
My, the Internet really is full of things:
Sparkly
invertebrates!
Cats:
Aspen curled up next to me during the night! She was even closer to my
alleged cat-eating end! Of course she scarpered as soon as I moved.
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
24 January 2010 - Sunday
My, the Internet really is full of things:
Make your own Sailor Senshi!
(via Marith)
Gaming: We tried starting Thrace right at 17:00, and
it sort of worked. It did not take too long to level, even though Ken
and his
Pay for Plusses (if you use
Windows) account
helped Marith pick a feat, and Ken did not have to cook, so there was
no doom there.
My character is still the lamest, but that is because I am me, and
also I have great talent at finding the weakest class in any class-based
system.
Next session, we will go find the nexus of magic power underneath the
town, and probably get eaten by undead demons.
Cats:
Twelve paws! Also, three tails!
Writing: Double check.
Make a comment!
23 January 2010 - Saturday
Housekeeping: Last four bags of books to
BookBuyers, and they took
almost everything! Now I have room to accumulate another pile of books
to go away.
My, the Internet really is full of things: Beautiful
clouds!
Random Encounters: Earl, in the used book store,
with the hat. (Why does Earl look better in hats than me? Hmph.)
Visual Entertainments: Started
Aquarion. It reminds me of Rahxephon, only
with more people being sucked into solid objects and stuff.
Cats:
Ghirardelli is very adorable, but not much like a keyboard. Aspen and
Marmalade are also adorable, but mostly lurk on the bed where they can
nestle in the covers.
Writing: Check.
things on the internets by marith (Sun Jan 24 21:18:37 2010)
Those are really very beautiful clouds! Some of his other pictures are impossibly stunning, too.
Make a comment!
22 January 2010 - Friday
Work: Phone calls from yesterday rescheduled for
Monday: 1. Interviews scheduled for Monday: 1.
Housekeeping: Bah, only 50% acceptance at
BookBuyers! Admittedly, half of
what I took was stuff that they had previously rejected, but that was
like a year ago, and they did take some of it this time.
Cats:
It is very adorable when kitties sleep by my feet, but having to keep my
legs in the same position all night makes them sad in the morning.
Writing: FAIL.
Make a comment!
21 January 2010 - Thursday
Work: Phone conversations successfully conducted: 0.
(According to her vacation message, the person I was supposed to talk to
was out sick today.) Follow-up interviews to interviews from last week:
1. I think this will probably fall through because I wasn't able to say,
"Support is my LIFE!" and the hiring manager has been scarred by people
who suck up her extensive training and then leave the group. This is sad,
because I'm pretty sure I could do the job and not go crazy or anything,
but I totally see where she's coming from.
My, the Internet really is full of things:
PIRATES!
Visual Entertainments: Finished Lucky
Star. Aww!
Cats:
Twelve paws, and also six ears!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
20 January 2010 - Wednesday
Work: Phone calls arranged for tomorrow, in
preparation for interviews in the next few days: 1.
Visual Entertainments: Started last disc of Lucky
Star. Aww.
Cats:
Twelve scampering paws!
Writing: Double check.
Make a comment!
19 January 2010 - Tuesday
Work: Jobs applied for: 2.
Visual Entertainments:
- Code Geass R2 24-25: That was a dramatically satisfying
ending.
- Darker Than Black 14: Electrical powers have many uses.
- Oh! Edo Rocket 16-17: Humans are so prejudiced against
shapeshifting alien monsters.
- Avatar 16: Katara is scary.
Cats:
The cats were so oppressed! I locked them all in the back room so the
workmen could come in and replace my balcony door, and they languished for
hours and hours until finally the manager admitted the workmen weren't
actually going to come today. So not only were the cats oppressed, they
will have to be oppressed again in a week or two!
Writing: FAIL.
Make a comment!
18 January 2010 - Monday
Work: Phone interviews successfully conducted: 1.
Code problems solved: 1. (Same company.) I also talked to the people I
interviewed with last week, and tried to convince them I'm not too
light-minded for a very serious enterprise support environment. I have
no idea if they believed me.
Gaming: For a while I've been trying to figure out
how to combine the fun of a roleplaying game with the fun of a card game
(specifically
Mythos, but
there are many other fun card games),
but my ideas keep developing concrete rules and turning into just card
games. This is ultimately because I haven't defined exactly what I mean
by "RPG fun" and "card game fun", but proximately I keep stumbling over
what to do with the role of GM as adventure designer/player of the
opposition. I know there are GM-less RPGs, but it has been demonstrated
that I am pants at running anything even slightly more indie than D&D.
Game design is hard, let's die in a pit with bugs and worms! (Start
with a deck containing three bug cards and seven worm cards...)
Visual Entertainments: Finished the fifth disc of
Lucky Star.
After some consideration, I have
concluded the genre is best expressed as a cross between
Azumanga Daioh and
Digi Charat. This
may explain why I keep typing the <cite> tag as <cute>.
Cats:
Twelve paws!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
17 January 2010 - Sunday
Gaming: What I ended up preparing worked okay,
although I still need to figure out how to run skill challenges that
don't devolve into everyone rolling to assist the person with the
highest relevant skill.
There was great surprise and consternation when Naled made with the
Stinking Cloud spell in the middle of a parley with kobolds, and then later
when the rescued caravaneers told people what had happened, but maybe his
comrades now have a better idea why he was run out of his homeland.
It's not really very likely that he'll be blamed for
starting a war.
Textual Entertainments: Kit made me buy
Skinwalker, by Faith Hunter. Jo is still more awesome.
Visual Entertainments: Fifth disc of Lucky
Star! I liked the old closing better.
Cats:
Aspen is still so very oppressed!
Writing: Check.
aww :) by kit (Tue Jan 19 08:29:32 2010)
You say the nicest things. But I do like Jane very very much!
Re: aww :) by Trip (Wed Jan 20 11:40:27 2010)
Jane is definitely my first choice for when I need faces ripped off, but Jo has better internal monologue, and we all know what's really important for a hero!
Make a comment!
16 January 2010 - Saturday
Housekeeping: Took eight bags of books to BookBuyers. Even though I got back
almost two bags, my front library is starting to look a little less
overfilled. Also, I have been officially advised that it's worth trying
rejected things again after just a month or two, so there is hope even for
these bags.
Gaming: Realized I really should prepare something
for tomorrow, prepared something, realized it was crap, prepared
something else.
Cats:
Twelve paws!
Writing: Double check.
Make a comment!
15 January 2010 - Friday
Work: Missed a couple of calls when I went out to
run errands, but I will call them on Monday.
Housekeeping: Took four bags of books to
BookBuyers, got back less than
one.
Argh: Aeriodisconnect has screwed up idiom
again. Fortunately the hosage seems to be limited to that
one server, so I still have the rest of the Internets.
Visual Entertainments: Finished the fourth disc of
Lucky Star. It's still cute, but I think they need something
new.
Cats:
Yay! Aspen sat up on something, instead of being ground-level-slinking
kitteh like usual!
Writing: FAIL. See above.
Make a comment!
14 January 2010 - Thursday
Work: Interviews successfully conducted: 1. It
turned out to be in the same building where I worked for Corio all those
years ago. As expected, my DBA/SQL skills are not all that they might
hope, but if all the other candidates are less l33t, then perhaps they
will decide it's worth training me up.
Textual Educations: Everything I know about SQL I
picked up on the Intertubes, so I got the O'Reilly Learning
SQL book (Alan Beaulieu) to get some theory. I'm still trying to get
an intuitive feel for JOINs, but the idea that the result of a SELECT
really is a table and can be JOINed, SELECTed, etc was enlightening.
Visual Entertainments: Started fourth disc of
Lucky Star. New characters!
Cats:
Twelve paws!
Writing: Check.
SQL by Jeremy (Mon Jan 18 22:14:42 2010)
SQL is fun. No, really. :-)
Re operating on results of select, with/as is your very best friend.
Re: SQL by Trip (Wed Jan 20 12:18:47 2010)
It might be fun! It seems like the sort of thing that needs more than one dimension to describe properly, though.
Make a comment!
13 January 2010 - Wednesday
Work: Interviews arranged for tomorrow: 1.
Apparently they weren't that impressed with me in the phone interview,
but they were even less impressed with the rest of the candidates, so
there's still hope.
Visual Entertainments: Finished third disc of
Lucky Star.
Cats:Twelve
paws!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
12 January 2010 - Tuesday
Work: FAIL.
Visual Entertainments: Tuesday Night Anime!
- Oh! Edo Rocket 15: The retired resident really scares me.
- Code Geass 23: Ah, the ever-increasing doom!
- Avatar 3.14-3.15: Go Mei! And Ty Lee!
- Darker Than Black 12-13: It's the return of the comic
relief characters!
Silly Computer Games: Check.
Cats:
Twelve paws!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
11 January 2010 - Monday
Work: Jobs applied for: 1. Phone interviews arranged
for later in the week: 1.
Visual Entertainments: Started the third disc of
Lucky Star. My theory is that
<rot13>
Xbangn vf n yrfovna.
</rot13>
In support: <rot13>
Ng yrnfg, fur fcraqf n ybg bs gvzr cynlvat bire-18 qngvat fvzf, naq jnf cerggl rinfvir jura nfxrq jung xvaq bs thl fur yvxrf.
</rot13>
Against: It's not really that kind of show. Also, I am notoriously
stupid as well as morally unedifying.
Silly Computer Games: Sangband
pwnz0rs my brain.
Cats:
Aspen spent much of the night sleeping on the strange lumps in the bed
that happened to be my legs, and did not spazz out hardly at all.
Writing: FAIL.
Make a comment!
10 January 2010 - Sunday
Gaming: There was great sleepiness, so for Thrace we had a
fight with wimpy goblins and that was about it. We got the last 80 XP we
needed to level, though!
Food: Ken made his special shortrib stew stuff, this
time with hand-made egg noodles to put under it!
Silly Computer Games:
Brogue
seems to have lost out to
Sangband. But the real loser is my brain.
Cats:
Twelve adorable paws!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
9 January 2010 - Saturday
Housework: After failing yesterday, I successfully
took a cartload (four bags) of books to
BookBuyers. They rejected a
whole bag, though, which saddens me. I guess I will have to do something
else with my piles of old Super Manga Blast and
Animerica Extra.
Visual Entertainments: Finished the second disc of
Lucky Star. It is still silly and cute.
Cats:
Bleah, cold. Ice Age Wooly Housecat Ghirardelli came out to pester me,
but Marmalade and Aspen spent pretty much the whole day hiding on my
bed.
Writing: Uninspired check.
Make a comment!
8 January 2010 - Friday
Work: Jobs applied for: 7.
Silly Computer Games: Brogue
and Sangband. Help, I seem to have fallen into the
Rogue Basin!
Cats:
Ghirardelli miaus and miaus so very plaintively!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
7 January 2010 - Thursday
Work: Sent reminders to people I contacted before,
but no new jobs applied for.
Housework: A few parts of my kitchen and bathroom
have been improved from Horrifying to merely Grotty. This leaves only
the entire rest of the apartment. Bah.
Visual Entertainments: It's good thing I've already
seen the first disc of Lucky Star, because this one is
borked. Bah!
Cats:
Twelve fuzzy paws!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
6 January 2010 - Wednesday
Work: Jobs applied for: 9½.
My, the Internet really is full of things: How many of them can
you get?
Housework: Bought and assembled four shelving unit
dealies, which now occupy the space formerly occupied by the Big Table
and hold everything that it should have held. (The Big Table is now in my
bedroom, where it will serve some function, no really.) There is space
for three more shelving units along that wall, so maybe later I can clear
off the coffee table too.
Sadly, Target does not appear to carry DVD racks like the ones I
have, or in fact any DVD racks at all, so I can't get the huge piles of
DVDs off the floor yet.
Visual Entertainments: When I added
Lucky Star to my Netflix queueueue, Netflix helpfully added
all of it, so I have the first disc which I have already seen, but
that's okay. It is Silly.
Cats:
Most of the spots where the cats used to flop have been unmade or at
least drastically changed by the Great Rearrangement, so now they
all flop on my bed all day.
Writing: Check.
9.5 by Jeremy (Wed Jan 6 19:23:33 2010)
Wow!
Re: 9.5 by Trip (Wed Jan 6 20:59:16 2010)
Indeed, I think it's a personal record!
You get some sort of award for making the first comment of 2010. I'm not sure what, though.
Special awards by Jeremy (Tue Jan 12 19:31:48 2010)
How about you run the first^H^H^H^H second session of PAD&D4?
Actually, surviving the first session probably counts as a reward, anyway.
Re: Special awards by Trip (Wed Jan 13 11:13:07 2010)
I can do that. I suppose I should come up with some encounters or something, huh?
Make a comment!
5 January 2010 - Tuesday
Work: Technical questionnaires completed: 1.
Refurbishments: All old grotty windows successfully
replaced with shiny new double-paned windows of +1 energy efficiency!
(Sadly, my front door is still -2 and my balcony door about -6.)
Visual Entertainments:
- Oh! Edo Rocket 13-14: Well, that can't be good.
- Code Geass R2 22: I wonder if they'll finally tell us
what FLEIA does.
- Avatar 3.13: That was silly, but pretty cool.
- Darker Than Black 10-11: Finally we get a little more
about the bizarreness of what's happened to the world!
Cats:
Poor Aspen, scruffed twice in one day! Poor Marmalade and Ghirardelli,
confined to single rooms twice in one day!
Writing: Check.
Make a comment!
4 January 2010 - Monday
Work: Hiring managers spoken to: 1. Emails from
companies that previously spurned me: 1.
Arrrgh: The manager claimed we'd be given 48 hours
notice before being invaded by workmen bearing new windows, but instead
I got a notice this evening that I am to be invaded tomorrow, so instead
of writing or watching anime with Marith or reading, I have been
rearranging furniture to make room for window replacement. The manager
was quite apologetic, but that didn't make my furniture any lighter or
smaller.
Gaming: With Great Power... (Michael
Miller) is an interesting indie superhero game with extra narrativism
and a card-based system. It uses a lot of comic-book terminology (panel
instead of action, page instead of round, etc), but it's not any more
annoying than the movie or TV terms used by so many games, and there's
one bit that's actually not bad. Like anything that appears in a comic,
anything that happens in WGP has to be scripted (cards
played to determine who wins and has narration rights), pencilled
(possible outcomes brainstormed with the input of other players), and
inked (finally narrated by whoever won narration rights). Most groups
play that way anyway, but it's good to have it recognized by game
designers.
Heroes are written up as about half a dozen aspects, of which one or at
most two are powers and the rest DNPCs, allies, convictions, secret
identities, origin details, and other story elements that can be used
against them. When the heroes are created, the group has to establish a
theme of the form "X vs Y" (Ideals vs Practicality, Justice vs Vengeance)
and each aspect gets assigned to one side of the theme, with at least one
per character on each side. Villains are similar, but usually with fewer
aspects and one aspect has to be The Plan.
Bad outcomes of conflict scenes are represented by adding "suffering" to
aspects. When an aspect accumulates enough suffering, it comes under the
control of the GM (DNPC kidnapped, allies alienated, convictions
teetering), and if not redeemed, it becomes permanently transformed (DNPC
recuited by villain, secret identity blown, radiation accident). If every
hero's main aspect is transformed, the villains' plan succeeds, otherwise
it's foiled.
Aspects can't be used in conflicts until they've been introduced in
character-building ("enrichment") scenes. Even enrichment scenes have a
little conflict, but it's just one set of stakes on each side, resolved
by the comparison of one card from each side.
Conflict scenes use a more complicated system, with multiple chances
for aspects to accumulate suffering, but it's still based on comparing
cards. Suit has to be followed unless a penalty is paid, and changing
suit requires a description of how the battle is being changed
(attacking the infernal device instead of the villain, using villainous
dialogue against the pinned hero, picking up a car when fisticuffs
aren't doing the job).
WGP implements the principle that present failure leads
to future success in two ways. In erichment scenes, whoever plays the
lower card gets to keep the higher card played by the opponent, thus
improving their hand. In conflict scenes, getting cards from the
opponent is more random, but whenever a character yields, the Story Arc
counter increments, tilting the rules slightly more in favor of the
players and more against the GM.
I'd like to try it sometime, but I'm pretty sure it's far too
narrative for any group I'm part of.
Cats:
Marmalade and Ghirardelli are quite intrigued by the new arrangment of
Things, but poor Aspen is probably horribly traumatized.
Writing: FAIL. See above.
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3 January 2010 - Sunday
Gaming: Finally, kobold extravaganza victory! The
sandstorm was enough to tempt the PCs into attacking again, and even
enough to keep them from getting horribly murderized. The high point was
probably when Damaia used Crackling Fire to make a bunch of kobolds
vunerable to fire and lightning just in time for Naled to set them all
on fire and Thor charge up his spirit frog and get them struck by lightning
every time somebody hit one, although slowing and immobilizing the
buffest kobold and parking Stinking Cloud on her was also good. The low
point was probably Thor getting knocked off a cliff and having to make
death checks. Neverthless, in the end all the kobolds were defeated and
the caravan was rescued!
Level UP!
Visual Entertainments: Finished Venus Versus
Virus. Meep.
Cats:
Twelve paws!
Writing: Check.
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2 January 2010 - Saturday
Visual Entertainments: More Venus Versus
Virus. If this really is the last disc, it's going to be a pretty
compressed ending.
Cats:
Running the space heater under the computer desk makes my feets warm,
but also causes kitties to crowd out my keyboard. Hm.
Writing: Check.
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1 January 2010 - Friday
It's 2010!!
(Is it the future yet?)
Textual Entertainments: Catching Fire
(Suzanne Collins) is the sequel to The Hunger Games and is
just about as grim. However, by the end of the book there's hope that in
the third book, everyone will die relatively quickly!
Visual Entertainments: Started the second disc of
Venus Versus Virus. There is still plenty of doom!
Cats:
I have twelve paws but it is only 2010! Maybe I'm ahead of the curve!
Writing: Check.
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