Annoying Game Questions You Want Answered

Ignimortis · Post by **Ignimortis** » Thu May 09, 2019 6:28 am

Kaelik wrote:Instead of making mindless creatures and intelligent creatures make bad decisions, just make revivify a 1st level spell with a 1 minute time until use. Then intelligent creatures ignore downed enemies because there is nothing to gain and mindless enemies can savage a corpse while the party finishes it off and then raise their friend.

Huh. That's...a neat idea, actually. Might not work in every type of game, but works for a campaign I have in mind...

Thaluikhain · Post by **Thaluikhain** » Sat May 11, 2019 3:51 pm

With the recentish discussion of Earthdawn as a prehistoric post-apocalyptic game, and any number of modern or futuristic post-apocalyptic games, are there any post-apocalyptic games of note set in other time periods?

angelfromanotherpin · Post by **angelfromanotherpin** » Sat May 11, 2019 4:21 pm

Day After Ragnarok is set in 1948, with the main apocalyptic event going down in 1945.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Sat May 11, 2019 5:53 pm

Thaluikhain wrote:With the recentish discussion of Earthdawn as a prehistoric post-apocalyptic game, and any number of modern or futuristic post-apocalyptic games, are there any post-apocalyptic games of note set in other time periods?

Most D&D campaign settings are technically post apocalyptic with the pre-apocalypse civilization having been Roman Imperial or some flavor of Atlantean.

-Username17

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Wed May 15, 2019 7:53 pm

Does it count as shower thought if you got it in the tub?

So, with the EMPIRE getting a straight upgrade with Primaris Marines and Eldar and Tau Tech . . Did anybody else get some new toys?
Are there for some reason now all stats +1 Chaos Spess Mehringues as well?
Or are they still the regular old 30k Traitor Legions with their outdated Tech and not enough ressources to rebuild?
How is this fair on the game table?
Is it just a constant ROFLSTOMP for the Empire against anybody else?

Fwib · Post by **Fwib** » Wed May 15, 2019 9:30 pm

Didn't 40K go with some flavour of 'the old stuff is better' due to the (partial) collapse of civilisation? Given that, shouldn't the from-the-old-days traitor legions have better stuff (assuming in full function) anyway?

Omegonthesane · Post by **Omegonthesane** » Wed May 15, 2019 10:22 pm

The setting goes back and forth on this - e.g. Razorbacks and Plasma Cannons and Assault Cannons either were invented post-Heresy or are to hard to maintain in the Warp, so CSMs don't get either.

When examples of hte same tech are compared side by side the older one tends to be better, but it isn't as simple as "old good, new bad".

deaddmwalking · Post by **deaddmwalking** » Thu May 16, 2019 2:30 am

There's also a bunch of 'this is really old but we just discovered it last week'.

Nobody invents anything, but they're always finding some 'archanotech' that the traitor legions didn't know about before they escaped/fled to the Eye of Terror.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Thu May 16, 2019 5:37 am

Stahlseele wrote:and Eldar and Tau Tech

I assume you mean the grav-stuff, in which case that's also Necron tech, and it's also Horse Heresy era Imperial tech. "Floating" isn't really a protected thing as it turns out.

Did anybody else get some new toys?

Genestealer Cults got power tools and mining equipment that, at least before the new edition where I can't be fucked even downloading the rules to look at, were legitimately better than 90% of the varieties of power weapon out there, especially for Strength 3 humans (where S +3 happens to be the exact same thing as S x2). You could argue that that is Imperial tech, but you will also notice that no Imperial model actually has such things.

Tau have been getting BIGGER AND BETTER mecha suits. Some of them are quite decent indeed. I don't think they got anything new this edition but they're still on cooldown from playing the "New wave of stuff that makes us awesome" card.

Chaos have been getting more Dinozords over time - a while back now, they got the flying one that was super good and people complained about it being good. They also got two other ones, one of which could spit out three Plasma Cannon shots per turn without Getting Hot (or could swap two of those for gatling Autocannons), and the other one... also exists. Now they have a mechaspider thing with some decent weapon loadouts and also a guy riding on top, armed with a chainglaive (that I suppose is also new tech in that nobody else has thought to glue a chainsword onto the end of a pole).

Chaos also now has their own "I can't believe it's not an Assault Cannon". I can't remember what the stats were said to be, I also can't remember what the current Ass Cannon stats are, so I can't compare them but apparently it's the bee's knees (or perhaps the wasp's shins) and people want to just load four of them onto their Havoc squads. Note: a box of Havocs comes with only one or two of these and people are rightfully annoyed.

They sort of already had Ass Cannons in the following ways:
1. The better older version found on the Old Version Dreadnoughts
2. Thousand Sons have their own special hellfire gatling guns.

Orks have a whole slew of new vehicles that may or may not be good.

Eldar are still on cooldown from their big time in the spotlight being "the super best".

I think the only new Necron thing since 7th? edition has been a single new model for Crypteks and also a giant fucking mechaspider thing from Forgeworld. Apparently it does kick a fair amount of ass though.

Whiysper · Post by **Whiysper** » Thu May 16, 2019 10:26 am

They're called Reaper Chaincannons, and it's two heavy bolters stuck together at 24" range rather than 36". Pretty good, and Havocs got +1T and move-and-fire heavy weapons without penalty. So yeah. Solid anti-infantry dakka.

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Thu May 16, 2019 10:34 am

>>Eldar are still on cooldown from their big time in the spotlight being "the super best".

The old metal/resin shining spears and dark reapers are among their best units when combined with soulburst, the mechanic where when an Eldar unit is removed you can have a nearby unit do one action.

It's popular to have that 'nearby one unit' be reapers launching a hail of missiles (which are equal to vehicle missile launchers, in the past they were weaker), or the shining spears to charge in with their high strength high armor penetration weapons.

Iduno · Post by **Iduno** » Fri May 17, 2019 2:06 pm

Koumei wrote: Chaos have been getting more Dinozords over time - a while back now, they got the flying one that was super good and people complained about it being good.

That is the most 40K player thing I've ever heard. I mean, who complains about robot dinosaurs, even janky ones? Especially flying or with lazers.

Something cool happens for someone else, you think it's cool and try to get cool things for yourself as well.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Fri May 17, 2019 2:17 pm

Iduno wrote: That is the most 40K player thing I've ever heard. I mean, who complains about robot dinosaurs, even janky ones? Especially flying or with lazers.

Something cool happens for someone else, you think it's cool and try to get cool things for yourself as well.

It's a lot less cool when the thing in question is a one hundred and forty dollar model that is individually more powerful than your army. It's like if people were allowed to buy loot boxes in board games with real money. I can see why other players would be pissed about that.

This is very unlike Magic the Gathering. In MtG, the cards have rarities, but the cost of individual powerful cards is simply set by the secondary market. A card like Teferi: Hero of Dominaria is not more rare in card packs than some random mythic that doesn't see play. It costs money because people buy extras off each other for real money, not because Wizards of the Coast is charging more for packs that have Teferi in them.

In Warhammer, Games Workshop sets the price and the power of the models. So when they make overpowered models that are also overcosted, that is them literally putting their hand out and asking players to pay-to-win.

-Username17

Iduno · Post by **Iduno** » Fri May 17, 2019 2:31 pm

Ah, right. I forget what class of company we're talking about.

rampaging-poet · Post by **rampaging-poet** » Mon Jun 03, 2019 3:25 am

I've been diving into polymorph cheese in 3.5 this weekend and found an oblique reference to "paragon wolves." I've found the template and the arguments for being able to polymorph into templated creatures (circa 2004 - later errata and/or "polymorph subschool" stuff may have changed that). However, I'm having a little trouble parsing which parts of the Paragon template you end up with. Specifically there's a bunch of typed bonuses to attacks, damage, skills, and saves.

Definite benefits over base creature: triple speed, +5 nat armour if base form's is lower, +13 insight bonus to special attacks where applicable, +15 to physical scores, free-floating racial bonus feat.

Things that aren't granted: Spell-Like Abilities, Special Qualities

As far as I can tell the following bonuses are in limbo because they appear to be natural abilities rather than special qualities, but they aren't specifically granted by polymorph because they are not "racial" bonuses:
[*]+12/+12 Insight/Luck bonuses to AC
[*]+25 Luck bonus to attack rolls
[*]+20 Luck bonus to damage on melee and thrown ranged attacks
[*]+10 Insight bonus to Saving Throws
[*]+10 Competence bonus to Skill Checks

Which of the above abilities carry over with polymorph?

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Tue Jun 04, 2019 5:58 am

rampaging-poet wrote: Which of the above abilities carry over with polymorph?

That question is unanswerable because polymorph was errataed like a dozen times during the life cycle of 3.5, culminating in the bizarre massive multi-book errata to create the "polymorph spell type" around the release of the PHB 2 which in turn made everything fucking crazy.

Various authors had a go at "fixing" Polymorph, and while every one of those attempts was a catastrophic failure, the exact nature of the brokenness was quite different one to the other. The final form was "I can no longer even parse this spell" which is broken in another way. Seriously, you had rants in the PHB 2 which referenced errata that referenced a PHB spell description that itself inherited from another spell which itself had errata. And after five layers of text inheritance I seriously had no idea what the final form was supposed to even say, and obviously neither did the authors.

-Username17

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Fri Jun 14, 2019 9:00 am

On 40k models...

Genestealer cults sell well, get lots of new models. Tyranids proper have gotten nothing new.

I've been thinking that they're going to have a Kerrigan type figure emerge from the GSC, that breaks off from the hivemind for her own mixed cultist and tyranid bio-monster hybrid setting.

The tyranids then get new 'reincarnated magus' models of greater daemon scale.

There's been a trend for daemon scale models to be less monstrous and more humanoid. Treeman is now a naavi with barky skin, the skaven greater daemon is more heroic looking, the greater daemons are less animalistic.

So a new tyranid like a the more bio-armor looking tokusatsu villains

K · Post by K » Sat Jun 15, 2019 5:00 am

rampaging-poet wrote:I've been diving into polymorph cheese in 3.5 this weekend and found an oblique reference to "paragon wolves." I've found the template and the arguments for being able to polymorph into templated creatures (circa 2004 - later errata and/or "polymorph subschool" stuff may have changed that). However, I'm having a little trouble parsing which parts of the Paragon template you end up with. Specifically there's a bunch of typed bonuses to attacks, damage, skills, and saves.

Definite benefits over base creature: triple speed, +5 nat armour if base form's is lower, +13 insight bonus to special attacks where applicable, +15 to physical scores, free-floating racial bonus feat.

Things that aren't granted: Spell-Like Abilities, Special Qualities

As far as I can tell the following bonuses are in limbo because they appear to be natural abilities rather than special qualities, but they aren't specifically granted by polymorph because they are not "racial" bonuses:
[*]+12/+12 Insight/Luck bonuses to AC
[*]+25 Luck bonus to attack rolls
[*]+20 Luck bonus to damage on melee and thrown ranged attacks
[*]+10 Insight bonus to Saving Throws
[*]+10 Competence bonus to Skill Checks

Which of the above abilities carry over with polymorph?

There is a strong argument that templates are not options with Polymorph in the RAW and errata.

I’d find one of the citations for it, but I don’t feel like checking a dozen sources of contradictory text.

rampaging-poet · Post by **rampaging-poet** » Sat Jun 15, 2019 7:06 am

Thanks for the answers! I don't know where the errata is, so my plan is to run it as written in 3.5. Double-checking my copy, I can see both arguments on polymorph with templates.

The argument for polymorph snagging templates is that it clearly overrides alter self's limits on what forms you can take. Because the list of available forms has been overriden, polymorph's text determines whether templates are available. Polymorph has no restriction, so templates should be allowed.

There are two arguments against using templated forms. First, the no-template limit could be a separate clause from the HD, size, and type restrictions. Polymorph therefore inherits the no-template clause despite overriding the latter three. The second argument is that the no-template clause is part of the "things you get" list. If polymorph modifies the list of things you get without overriding it, the no-template clause comes with it. If not, polymorph lets you take on templated forms but fails to grant you the natural abilities and even gross physical qualities of the new form - clearly absurd!

I'm not 100% sure which I'll run at my table yet. Either way there's plenty of brokenness to go around just with stuff that definitely works. It just might not be worth at as an in-combat action for this particular NPC.

K · Post by K » Sun Jun 16, 2019 7:27 am

rampaging-poet wrote:Thanks for the answers! I don't know where the errata is, so my plan is to run it as written in 3.5. Double-checking my copy, I can see both arguments on polymorph with templates.

The argument for polymorph snagging templates is that it clearly overrides alter self's limits on what forms you can take. Because the list of available forms has been overriden, polymorph's text determines whether templates are available. Polymorph has no restriction, so templates should be allowed.

There are two arguments against using templated forms. First, the no-template limit could be a separate clause from the HD, size, and type restrictions. Polymorph therefore inherits the no-template clause despite overriding the latter three. The second argument is that the no-template clause is part of the "things you get" list. If polymorph modifies the list of things you get without overriding it, the no-template clause comes with it. If not, polymorph lets you take on templated forms but fails to grant you the natural abilities and even gross physical qualities of the new form - clearly absurd!

I'm not 100% sure which I'll run at my table yet. Either way there's plenty of brokenness to go around just with stuff that definitely works. It just might not be worth at as an in-combat action for this particular NPC.

As a player, careful reading of the text serves you.

As a DM, you just have to say "how easy is it to break this text... oh shit, there is no reason in the text to not dumpster-dive a dozen templates on one form? I don't want to mess with that..."

rampaging-poet · Post by **rampaging-poet** » Sun Jun 16, 2019 5:42 pm

True, but when I get down to house-ruling it I'd like to be aware of what parts are house rules and what parts are (at least arguably) RAW.

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Mon Jun 17, 2019 5:07 am

Is the Dragon Form of the Dungeonomicon still a good idea as an insert directly into an otherwise regular Pathfinder game?

Dragon Form
Transmutation
Level: Sor/Wiz 6
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 Standard Action
Range: Touch
Target: One Willing Creature
Duration: 10 minutes/level (D)
Saving Throw: Fortitude Negates (Harmless)
Spell Resistance: Yes.

The final incantations are completed and you transform into a dragon.

The target character assumes the form of a huge dragon. The character gets a +14 Strength bonus and a -4 Dexterity penalty. The character gains a +18 Natural Armor Bonus. The character gains immunity to one energy type (which must be Acid, Cold, Electricity, Fire, or Poison), and a breath weapon that inflicts 1d6 per level of the same type of damage. Using the breath weapon is a supernatural ability that requires a standard action and may only be used at most once every 1d4+1 rounds. The character has a flight speed of 120' with poor maneuverability. A character in Dragon Form has three natural attacks: a primary Bite and two secondary claws. Worn equipment is subsumed into the new draconic form.

Orca · Post by **Orca** » Mon Jun 17, 2019 5:33 am

It's a lot better than the form of the dragon spell line which is native to PF, and by extension also better than PF's other polymorph spells. Does that bother you?

virgil · Post by **virgil** » Mon Jun 17, 2019 6:14 am

Nope. I'm only bothered if the spell unbalanced gameplay by giving a wizard such a buff spell (or even a couple character replacement versions); obsolescence of a few other spells don't mean much to me.

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Wed Jun 19, 2019 6:02 am

Been reading about a set of 12 archtypes used in modern marketing

https://www.slideshare.net/EmilyBennett ... the-outlaw

The idea is that the audience sees themselves in a certain way and will respond better to advertising that suits their self image. So someone who considers themselves a maverick has a targeted ad of the outlaw harley biker. Someone who sees themselves as a master of their world will pick the luxury sedan that feels majestic, etc.

It seems like something applicable to looking at "why somebody plays an RPG" or what they get out of roleplay... or when ideas don't mesh and the game falls apart. This is not a science of course, but a way to organize thoughts or think about writing/design/audience.