Easy DM cheat as well, give them maps and handouts. Or a skill within the party to do something like Tarot with an actual set of cards.
Having done the first time campaigns with new groups a couple of times, even having done all the sensible stuff like have a session or two to set up characters, work out who they are - and then even just have a quick session where they then meet up and play some silly pub games to learn the rules (and given hints like - you're a wizard, what's on your character sheet that lets you cheat at darts), to buy time to then actually start writing stuff* - until you're some way in everything is just in your head. You can see the connections, and why stuff matters and the backstory because you wrote it and you know what is relevant and what is just a quick off the cuff description.
Takes a lot more to get the players invested in that same world because they've been there at best 10% of the time you have and have never seen the big picture. But a map that shows them places they might want to go, or some hand out that they can keep coming back to, is going to make it more real for them as well.
For a lot of players it's just improv, only the current moment counts - if you want a story you need to make them want it to, and make the background part of the puzzle they're trying to solve. But if you're doing that, and they're not realised that's the way the game is supposed to be played, you need to give them actual things they will hold onto for the moments they aren't paying attention or making notes.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited January 2019
I tried the map thing. The guy I specifically made it for never really appreciated it and left the game in a mutual quitting of eachother’s games.
Also even with a premade thing with blank cells making like 30 different segments of a hive giving them bare utilities and personality was hard. Specific locations exist but for everything else that shit is abstracted and narratived out.
Edit: that player with the OP character has decided to consciously semi-retire that character. He’s going to Terra to be sanctioned after that meeting with the daemonhost awakened his abilities.
He has also told me his own personal misgivings about how he plays. I’m happy he’s trying a brand new character in an effort to fit in with the rest power-wise and to roleplay someone different.
Edit: Since the holidays I’ve changed my tune quite a bit. I’ve gotten to play myself and have been having a good time GMing the last recent sessions.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited January 2019
I watched the Steely Dan episode of JoJo part 3. He has a power that makes anything done to him get done to the person he uses it on. Now assuming your players are not okay with just killing a character with that power and thus killing one of their friends, how would you make a character (NPC) with a power like that? Obviously this idea is not original.
If you wanted it to be a proper challenge and puzzle, you wouldn’t make it a thing where if the character has more health they would just do a battle of attrition on it. The damage would have to be proportional between characters or they have to share the same wounds. They can’t just win by abusing a loss recovery mechanic like death saves or fate. Healing one would heal the other.
One use would be to use it as a way to drive players forward by taking their character or an NPC hostage in return for a favor to someone shady.
Also maybe one could use it to make a doppelganger situation more interesting.
Once again this is not original, I just think it could be neat.
Edit: one of my players named their new ship after Spandau Ballet which I believe is the secret lemotif of the Emperor. If anyone asks Spandau is a Kasr on Cadia where their pilot is from. Also Ballet because she fly goode.
All my musically named characters usually have an explanation for their name. “Yankee” Rose is a bounty hunter was the victim of a failed hanging that damaged her throat and voice. Wu Tang is named after the group but he’s from a planet that mixes Chinese and Western influences and knows kung fu and embodies the spirit of hardcore rap, is full of bravado, and has dirty fighting skill to match. Benjamin Breeg is named after the Iron Maiden song and it’s not his guilty past but the past of the spirit who kept possessing him that is the song reference. Sometimes the names make no sense like the antagonist Rainmaker that had nothing to do with the song and the in-story justification I made was a stretch (he kidnapped the children of a tribe of a newly found human civilization on a frontier world and threw them out of valkyries to incite the tribe to fight against the Imperials while doing a rainmaker dance [think Man of Stone from Punisher MAX]) so I renamed into something more fitting.
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AssuranIs swinging on the SpiralRegistered Userregular
I’ve caught the itch to play some D&D again and I came across this Reddit/dnd post talking about how the Roman Empire is the perfect D&D setting, and I have to agree. An empire beset on all sides by Barbarian hordes, struggling under the weight of bureaucracy as corruption whithers it from within. A world on the cusp of industrial revolution but still has “evidence” of the gods work and living heroes of legend among the populus. Where else can you find indoor plumbing and heating in a temple to Neptune? Plus, if I’m a little loose with the 500 years or so of history, I can have a strong Parthian Empire right next door. I’m going to workshop this with my group and see how we want to divide up the world. To this end I’m interested in any recommendations for history books that cover life in this time period.
I’m also running an L5R game with a different crowd. I picked up Emerald Empire, and while I’ve only skimmed it to far it looks amazing as a campaign setting book goes. Very light on character options if that’s what you’re interested in. To be honest, I feel like I’m rereading “Everyday Life in Traditional Japan” which I had picked up and read in preparation of running L5R.
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited January 2019
JoJo part 3 is an amazing source of villains to crib from for RPGs.
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VanguardBut now the dream is over. And the insect is awake.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
Happy new year, RPG thread.
My long running DCC group is currently en route to the moon in a spaceship piloted by a renegade Black Goblin mage who has stuffed the hull with bombs. His mission? To destroy the moon.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
My long running DCC group is currently en route to the moon in a spaceship piloted by a renegade Black Goblin mage who has stuffed the hull with bombs. His mission? To destroy the moon.
It blocks his view of Venus
The end of the last DH adventure I GM (we’ve had like 3 over the course of the winter [many XPs]) ended with the group sitting down, almost getting outright murdered because they wasted the time of the daughter of a dark eldar archon, and just talking their way to a solution with a kroot kindred tribe. They also got a big crate of illegal guns that literally has a post it note on it that says “do not open. that means you.”
For one player semi-retiring his character, I got a send off for him and basically the end of this campaign of individual adventures over the winter. They’re going to meet the arch-villain of this theatre of campaigns, the guy behind most of their troubles, personally.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited January 2019
The session went amazingly. I finally got to trot out this archvillain and playing him was so fun.
I got done all the things I wanted for DH this winter. Taking a break from GMing and going to play in a 5E game. I’m hoping to get the current character I’m playing in the front of dangerous situations so I can bring out Katt Dogg, the gnoll rap bard. Leaving his old traveling troupe, GWA, to go solo, Katt Dogg would meet the new party and join them to earn money and influence to bring his family to a safer place. Katt uses a small staff of prestidigitation to amplify his voice and help cast bard spells. Katt is small and weak among gnolls but is wise and charismatic. He has constant friction against the law.
Rock and roll tiefling bards have been done. I’m bringing hip-hop to DnD.
I just overhauled a bunch of out-of combat stuff for my game, thought you all might be interested. These are all pretty expensive abilities, progression-wise, and finding trainers for some of the more wild Tier III options might be difficult.
The crafting stuff refers to the general list of items available to players, and is kinda difficult to judge the value of without it, I'm just posting it for completeness' sake.
The Spirit stat that appears often in the list goes from 3-9, for reference. You can have 1/2/3 rituals active at once at 3/6/9 Spirit. It doesn't do much in combat unless you get KOed, and it mostly serves as a "do magic stuff" stat.
For reference on the ranges and sizes listed, 1x1 is as large as a normal human, and the range of most combat skills goes from 1-6.
I'm leaving on vacation Saturday and will be gone for a week without internet, but when I get back, I'm all for jumping back in.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited January 2019
I have the name for my final campaign with my oldest group.
So, to simplify, in my Dark Heresy campaigns the god Malal did exist and was part of the big four way before Slaanesh existed. He was a god of banality and personified the recursive nature of Chaos. They beat him up, spread his essence out, and it congealed into forming the warp storm in the 2E fluff, the Pandaemonium. All the factions want to manipulate the pandaemonium using ancient xenos tech that could have destroyed the warp storm or harnessed its power but that old race was destroyed before they could use it. The main antagonist group, the Tarot, performed the steps necessary for this god stuff to be released, setting most of the plot into motion
We have warring for it:
The Inquisition with squabbling factions.
A Dark Eldar archon.
The Tarot, a huge entrenched sector wide conspiracy comprised of mercenaries, renegades, and Chaos (except Nurgle) led by an ultra charismatic, manipulative, and powerful being.
The Bilious Legions, a huge entrenched Nurglite conspiracy.
They will war for different pieces of that old race’s ancient weapon. The acolytes will trek across the Askellon sector meeting monsters, assassins, the horrors of the warp, and ancient shit that was not to be disturbed. I’m calling it God Dust Crusaders. I thought this whole thing up two years before I had even watched JoJo. I did not realize I had given the arch-villain what essentially is a stand until I thought about it a couple days later.
Anyone have any experience with My Little Pony Tales of Equestria Storyteller Game? Literally asking for a friend with a 7-year-old daughter who's looking for a good RPG to play with his children. I'll forward other recommendations too: they don't want to introduce the kids to D&D just yet as they'd like to start with something a little less violent.
飛べねぇ豚はただの豚だ。
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MaclayInsquequo Totus Es UnusHere and ThereRegistered Userregular
Anyone have any experience with My Little Pony Tales of Equestria Storyteller Game? Literally asking for a friend with a 7-year-old daughter who's looking for a good RPG to play with his children. I'll forward other recommendations too: they don't want to introduce the kids to D&D just yet as they'd like to start with something a little less violent.
It read to me like a very simplified Cortex (Firefly, Marvel Heroic, etc.) game, though I've heard Savage Worlds uses a similar resolution system if that helps. Traits have a die rating (d4-d20) that you roll against a difficulty score. If you have a relevant Talent then you can add that die to your roll as well. There's also a meta-currency to help you out of a jam. In terms of content issues it's mostly fine but does include some light combat ('Scuffling').
The book is very much written from the perspective that kids will be reading it, but that might make it a frustrating read for adults. Overall I find it a little too simplistic, but for a 7 year old it's probably about right.
Does anyone want to play a newbie friendly game of Dungeon World?
The premise is the heroes have been transported from across the multiverse to take part in a race to the top of a fairy king’s tower.
You can be anything, so long as you can afix it to the classes of Dungeon World. Dark elf cleric of night? Okay. Robot Robin Hood? Definitely.
Think Into the Spiderverse, Timesplitters, Planescape, Guardians of the Galaxy, just a really gonzo dungeon crawl.
It’s called Glamjin’s Tower of Glory and it’ll start properly once I have four players, but for now it’s just a thread to chat about and design your characters, and tell me what you’d like to see.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited February 2019
Hey I am making a fan overhaul of Dark Heresy 2E with big help from a friend of mine; Dark Heresy 2.1: Malice https://darkheresychainsofmalice.blogspot.com/2019/01/dark-heresy-21-fan-patch-in-work-big-wip.html
Suggestions or comments welcome. Some of it might only make sense to someone who knows the system, but I feel a good chunk of it could be understood by anyone with passing knowledge in TTRPGs.
Big inclusions: Expanded unarmed system, planted explosives system, proper chase rules, return of money, a comrade system for NPCs, an area of engagement system similar to DnD's, and a fervour system. Smaller in scale are core changes to equipment and damage. Oh also finally added a held action so that melee overwatch thing doesn't really need to exist anymore. Finally clarified overwatch rules and limited it so one can't literally go through a heavy machine gun's bandolier of ammo in a reaction. Added a Rank Privilege system to influence basically guaranteeing the ability to get items with enough influence. Added clarifications to the cover system including a simple fundamental change, added clarifications to difficult terrain, climbing, and grapnel and line. Made inspiration better. Changed character creation to be less jank. Added a Punisher Gatling Gun. Reintroduced sanctioning.
This thing is 57 pages long now.
Starring Ifrit from the Devil May Cry series
Added a google docs version of 2.1 with an index and page numberings along with a few readability changes as a link on the blog. It should be easier to read.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
New WIP by Mothman
I'm on break from GMing with smatterings of playing DnD 5E. It's fun. Have yet to bring out Katt Dogg.
How have y'all games been
Hey I am making a fan overhaul of Dark Heresy 2E with big help from a friend of mine; Dark Heresy 2.1: Malice https://darkheresychainsofmalice.blogspot.com/2019/01/dark-heresy-21-fan-patch-in-work-big-wip.html
Suggestions or comments welcome. Some of it might only make sense to someone who knows the system, but I feel a good chunk of it could be understood by anyone with passing knowledge in TTRPGs.
Big inclusions: Expanded unarmed system, planted explosives system, proper chase rules, return of money, a comrade system for NPCs, an area of engagement system similar to DnD's, and a fervour system. Smaller in scale are core changes to equipment and damage. Oh also finally added a held action so that melee overwatch thing doesn't really need to exist anymore. Finally clarified overwatch rules and limited it so one can't literally go through a heavy machine gun's bandolier of ammo in a reaction. Added a Rank Privilege system to influence basically guaranteeing the ability to get items with enough influence. Added clarifications to the cover system including a simple fundamental change, added clarifications to difficult terrain, climbing, and grapnel and line. Made inspiration better. Changed character creation to be less jank. Added a Punisher Gatling Gun. Reintroduced sanctioning.
This thing is 57 pages long now.
Starring Ifrit from the Devil May Cry series
Added a google docs version of 2.1 with an index and page numberings along with a few readability changes as a link on the blog. It should be easier to read.
Most of this was totally incomprehensible due to not knowing the previous rules you were changing, but I like your chase rules - I did something similar to the first paragraph of that myself, and your extension of that looks pretty solid. Same goes for dropping things.
2 points per fervor action seems really low since the costs are 10-30. Somebody's gonna get really annoyed referencing their character's religion ten times to earn enough points to do something. I would probably change it to +5 points per action, max +10 per session, and make them do something more elaborate RP-wise to get it. Also, this lets you divide all the numbers by five which is always nice.
On the line "-Overwatch can be activated only up to a number of times equal to total Perception or Agility bonus, whichever a character chooses" - This should just be "whichever is higher" because only a goose would pick a lower number.
This line "-Engagement is not automatically activated upon entry to a character's Area of Engagement unless that character is in a defensive stance, a held melee action has been activated, or the character entering the Area is attacking with melee." is repeating yourself since you laid out each method to enter engagement earlier in the section.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
Hey I am making a fan overhaul of Dark Heresy 2E with big help from a friend of mine; Dark Heresy 2.1: Malice https://darkheresychainsofmalice.blogspot.com/2019/01/dark-heresy-21-fan-patch-in-work-big-wip.html
Suggestions or comments welcome. Some of it might only make sense to someone who knows the system, but I feel a good chunk of it could be understood by anyone with passing knowledge in TTRPGs.
Big inclusions: Expanded unarmed system, planted explosives system, proper chase rules, return of money, a comrade system for NPCs, an area of engagement system similar to DnD's, and a fervour system. Smaller in scale are core changes to equipment and damage. Oh also finally added a held action so that melee overwatch thing doesn't really need to exist anymore. Finally clarified overwatch rules and limited it so one can't literally go through a heavy machine gun's bandolier of ammo in a reaction. Added a Rank Privilege system to influence basically guaranteeing the ability to get items with enough influence. Added clarifications to the cover system including a simple fundamental change, added clarifications to difficult terrain, climbing, and grapnel and line. Made inspiration better. Changed character creation to be less jank. Added a Punisher Gatling Gun. Reintroduced sanctioning.
This thing is 57 pages long now.
Starring Ifrit from the Devil May Cry series
Added a google docs version of 2.1 with an index and page numberings along with a few readability changes as a link on the blog. It should be easier to read.
Most of this was totally incomprehensible due to not knowing the previous rules you were changing, but I like your chase rules - I did something similar to the first paragraph of that myself, and your extension of that looks pretty solid. Same goes for dropping things.
2 points per fervor action seems really low since the costs are 10-30. Somebody's gonna get really annoyed referencing their character's religion ten times to earn enough points to do something. I would probably change it to +5 points per action, max +10 per session, and make them do something more elaborate RP-wise to get it. Also, this lets you divide all the numbers by five which is always nice.
On the line "-Overwatch can be activated only up to a number of times equal to total Perception or Agility bonus, whichever a character chooses" - This should just be "whichever is higher" because only a goose would pick a lower number.
This line "-Engagement is not automatically activated upon entry to a character's Area of Engagement unless that character is in a defensive stance, a held melee action has been activated, or the character entering the Area is attacking with melee." is repeating yourself since you laid out each method to enter engagement earlier in the section.
It did not help that I didn't reformat the thing until later and the google doc is a lot easier to read, also yeah looking at it now, you really need the core rulebook. I even added it later.
I think that forces them to roleplay. Fervour already verges on being more fate points so I feel it needs to be harder to get.
It's me being me but I like how that sounds better. Also it can't be misread as the GM having the choice over the player. I know how semantic that is, but I literally made this thing based off a bunch of semantics and additions and changes I wanted after five years of GMing.
I like the repeat because it is a summation. I am very big on clarification. I think like half of the overhaul is clarifications.
You can't force RP, some players just don't do it. If it's just Fate points pt.2 then why not just make an extension to fate points instead of bolting on another system?
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
You can't force RP, some players just don't do it. If it's just Fate points pt.2 then why not just make an extension to fate points instead of bolting on another system?
Then they do not get the extra resource.
I felt there needed to be a resource for berserk and zealous types similar to the faith powers of 1E's splat Blood of Martyrs. There needed to be something more than frenzying. It is assymetric between player and npc.
If they were not going to do it, then they won't, or they would not be playing characters where you are assumed to roleplay a specific way like a Ministorum priest or Sister of Battle which even in vanilla suggests you play them in a certain way.
I am changing it to +5 with a max of +15 per session though. 10 is too little.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited February 2019
What you said did get me thinking, what if fervour was retooled to being based around willpower. You would raise it by willpower, you would use it through willpower, and rather than generalized devotion or singleminded aggression it instead is based more on the Steven King, WoD, and in actual 40k lore power of belief. The rituals I put would help those tests. I know that makes two mechanics dependent on willpower with psychic powers also dependent on it. Right now fervour is kind of bare bones and helps NPCs more than PCs.
With some more lore-based powers like a high amount of points being used to do something like stun a demon for a turn which has happened in lore with Euphrati Keeler in the Horus Heresy and once when daemons were hesitant to cross a sanctified cemetary for a moment.
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MrVyngaardLive From New EtoileStraight Outta SosariaRegistered Userregular
Folks: I'd suggest you go change your Roll20 passwords in the event you run games on that service, it was compromised.
"now I've got this mental image of caucuses as cafeteria tables in prison, and new congressmen having to beat someone up on inauguration day." - Raiden333
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
So I have something that may be fun. I made Beastmen for Dark Heresy https://darkheresychainsofmalice.blogspot.com/2019/02/homebrew-homeworld-beastman.html
these are technically sanctioned mutants used by inquisitors rather than the Warhammer Fantasy pillage, murder, and wipe shit everywhere ones.
So the fun thing is coming up with alternate beastmen species that give different characteristic modifiers and special abilities. For example, Wolfmen get Pack Attack making them count as two characters in respect to ganging up bonuses when two characters are fighting someone in melee. Bullmen get Red Rage and that gives bonus damage on charges. Ratmen get Rat Bastard and that gives them easier criticals on surprise rounds.
Making beastmen, what abilities and characteristics would you give them based on the animal they've partially mutated into?
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
edited February 2019
Taking a dip back into GM after a break for about two months. Got an adventure set up and a lull between busy work so it happened to be the right time.
One of my players tried to psychically crush a guy flying through the air in a MGS4/Ironman style mechanized armored warsuit when I was basically offering them a preview of future bosses fighting the villains' rival group. Those guys were there for story reasons, for them to know what they were going up against next adventure, and as flavor for the event unfolding. These bosses were supposed to notice the players were there, let them know they knew they were there with a tip of a hat or a smug grin or something, and then go off into the battle happening around because the big bad group wants the player group there. Luckily they couldn't because they were out of range for the player's new character's psychic power. The main villain group wants them to take out another rival villain group in the natural prosecution of their work. Had that psychic power worked and the pilot was wounded or even died, they would have had to face all fifty of the mooks on the ground, the daemons of the rival group, and two powerful lieutenants including one who basically has The Darkness and the other that has the instant teleportation and moveset of Vergil but faster. Also if that guy survived, a warmachine suit with missiles, gatling guns, and bladed "wings" on it.
That was just setup to let them know the battlefield is going to be really busy for them to rescue hostages an important NPC wants saved so they could run through it and face some conflict in their own little bubble of structured time but not like the whole shebang.
Like woo, tempting fate there. He has seemingly forgotten he is playing someone more squishy and not the Dark Heresy Goku of the team anymore.
That sounds really cool, how would you be doing it? Besides a more standard monster hunting Supernatural/X-Files thing like Hunter, I always thought something where you’re playing as highschool or college aged students way out of their depth on the supernatural would be fun.
That sounds really cool, how would you be doing it? Besides a more standard monster hunting Supernatural/X-Files thing like Hunter, I always thought something where you’re playing as highschool or college aged students way out of their depth on the supernatural would be fun.
MH’s rules are all about the social interaction between the characters (and they’re great rules), but I’m an old hat with Apocalypse World derived games so I’ll be making a lot of moves up on the fly to accommodate sneaking around and investigation.
My main idea is to run it like a cheap 90’s evening show, Buffy for instance. It’d be episodic, with an undercurrent of some conspiracy or bad judu in the town that comes to a head by the end.
I’m not thinking monster fights, at least not right until the end. Some episodes might not even have a villain, some might even just be the characters hanging out or dealing with a real problem.
You’re not monster hunters, or even really monsters yourself... you are... supernatural conduits, weirdness magnets, you make contact with stuff no one else is seeing.
Lastly, the plot is also made up a lot on your end, nothing stopping you being evil if you want. It’s still Monster Hearts after all.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
Yeah but like through roll20, discord, post-by-post, that chat based thingey? Weekly, monthly, or more or less?
Also how old would the characters be and where generally would it take place?
I might be able to bring out Tommy Kraut, brazen punk scam-artist.
That sounds really cool, how would you be doing it? Besides a more standard monster hunting Supernatural/X-Files thing like Hunter, I always thought something where you’re playing as highschool or college aged students way out of their depth on the supernatural would be fun.
MH’s rules are all about the social interaction between the characters (and they’re great rules), but I’m an old hat with Apocalypse World derived games so I’ll be making a lot of moves up on the fly to accommodate sneaking around and investigation.
My main idea is to run it like a cheap 90’s evening show, Buffy for instance. It’d be episodic, with an undercurrent of some conspiracy or bad judu in the town that comes to a head by the end.
I’m not thinking monster fights, at least not right until the end. Some episodes might not even have a villain, some might even just be the characters hanging out or dealing with a real problem.
You’re not monster hunters, or even really monsters yourself... you are... supernatural conduits, weirdness magnets, you make contact with stuff no one else is seeing.
Lastly, the plot is also made up a lot on your end, nothing stopping you being evil if you want. It’s still Monster Hearts after all.
How does that work with the MH playbooks? (I've never played Monsterhearts but am interested.)
@Endless_Serpents I've never played any of the PbtA games but I've been super interested in them for a while and would be down for this if you're recruiting!
@Tox
Nice one. I’ll set up a recruitment thread (which will then be the in-character thread once we start) on Thursday at the earliest.
We will be using the second edition, which is actually more of a errata, with a nice section on player boundaries and a few rough edges smoothed off. First and second are very much the same game for those that have only played first edition MH.
No one will need the MH book to play, I could easily fill you in on the playbooks (classes in D&D terms), and the basic moves without it even being “stealing”. The playbooks and basic moves have been free online from the beginning.
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KadokenGiving Ends to my Friends and it Feels StupendousRegistered Userregular
I’m interested, but the books you mentioned sounds like we aren’t playing average joes but powered people and I kind of prefer average joes against evil.
Also I got tree hundred views on me and my buddy’s overhaul. Yey. 200 views on the catgirl homebrew (felinids) and 20 on beastman. Mmmhmm *sideeyes 40k RPG reddit*
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Having done the first time campaigns with new groups a couple of times, even having done all the sensible stuff like have a session or two to set up characters, work out who they are - and then even just have a quick session where they then meet up and play some silly pub games to learn the rules (and given hints like - you're a wizard, what's on your character sheet that lets you cheat at darts), to buy time to then actually start writing stuff* - until you're some way in everything is just in your head. You can see the connections, and why stuff matters and the backstory because you wrote it and you know what is relevant and what is just a quick off the cuff description.
Takes a lot more to get the players invested in that same world because they've been there at best 10% of the time you have and have never seen the big picture. But a map that shows them places they might want to go, or some hand out that they can keep coming back to, is going to make it more real for them as well.
For a lot of players it's just improv, only the current moment counts - if you want a story you need to make them want it to, and make the background part of the puzzle they're trying to solve. But if you're doing that, and they're not realised that's the way the game is supposed to be played, you need to give them actual things they will hold onto for the moments they aren't paying attention or making notes.
Also even with a premade thing with blank cells making like 30 different segments of a hive giving them bare utilities and personality was hard. Specific locations exist but for everything else that shit is abstracted and narratived out.
Edit: that player with the OP character has decided to consciously semi-retire that character. He’s going to Terra to be sanctioned after that meeting with the daemonhost awakened his abilities.
He has also told me his own personal misgivings about how he plays. I’m happy he’s trying a brand new character in an effort to fit in with the rest power-wise and to roleplay someone different.
Edit: Since the holidays I’ve changed my tune quite a bit. I’ve gotten to play myself and have been having a good time GMing the last recent sessions.
If you wanted it to be a proper challenge and puzzle, you wouldn’t make it a thing where if the character has more health they would just do a battle of attrition on it. The damage would have to be proportional between characters or they have to share the same wounds. They can’t just win by abusing a loss recovery mechanic like death saves or fate. Healing one would heal the other.
One use would be to use it as a way to drive players forward by taking their character or an NPC hostage in return for a favor to someone shady.
Also maybe one could use it to make a doppelganger situation more interesting.
Once again this is not original, I just think it could be neat.
Edit: one of my players named their new ship after Spandau Ballet which I believe is the secret lemotif of the Emperor. If anyone asks Spandau is a Kasr on Cadia where their pilot is from. Also Ballet because she fly goode.
All my musically named characters usually have an explanation for their name. “Yankee” Rose is a bounty hunter was the victim of a failed hanging that damaged her throat and voice. Wu Tang is named after the group but he’s from a planet that mixes Chinese and Western influences and knows kung fu and embodies the spirit of hardcore rap, is full of bravado, and has dirty fighting skill to match. Benjamin Breeg is named after the Iron Maiden song and it’s not his guilty past but the past of the spirit who kept possessing him that is the song reference. Sometimes the names make no sense like the antagonist Rainmaker that had nothing to do with the song and the in-story justification I made was a stretch (he kidnapped the children of a tribe of a newly found human civilization on a frontier world and threw them out of valkyries to incite the tribe to fight against the Imperials while doing a rainmaker dance [think Man of Stone from Punisher MAX]) so I renamed into something more fitting.
Tom Holland suggests the following list His list.
I would add Mary Beard's other book, SPQR as well.
My long running DCC group is currently en route to the moon in a spaceship piloted by a renegade Black Goblin mage who has stuffed the hull with bombs. His mission? To destroy the moon.
It blocks his view of Venus
The end of the last DH adventure I GM (we’ve had like 3 over the course of the winter [many XPs]) ended with the group sitting down, almost getting outright murdered because they wasted the time of the daughter of a dark eldar archon, and just talking their way to a solution with a kroot kindred tribe. They also got a big crate of illegal guns that literally has a post it note on it that says “do not open. that means you.”
For one player semi-retiring his character, I got a send off for him and basically the end of this campaign of individual adventures over the winter. They’re going to meet the arch-villain of this theatre of campaigns, the guy behind most of their troubles, personally.
I got done all the things I wanted for DH this winter. Taking a break from GMing and going to play in a 5E game. I’m hoping to get the current character I’m playing in the front of dangerous situations so I can bring out Katt Dogg, the gnoll rap bard. Leaving his old traveling troupe, GWA, to go solo, Katt Dogg would meet the new party and join them to earn money and influence to bring his family to a safer place. Katt uses a small staff of prestidigitation to amplify his voice and help cast bard spells. Katt is small and weak among gnolls but is wise and charismatic. He has constant friction against the law.
Rock and roll tiefling bards have been done. I’m bringing hip-hop to DnD.
The crafting stuff refers to the general list of items available to players, and is kinda difficult to judge the value of without it, I'm just posting it for completeness' sake.
The Spirit stat that appears often in the list goes from 3-9, for reference. You can have 1/2/3 rituals active at once at 3/6/9 Spirit. It doesn't do much in combat unless you get KOed, and it mostly serves as a "do magic stuff" stat.
For reference on the ranges and sizes listed, 1x1 is as large as a normal human, and the range of most combat skills goes from 1-6.
Apparently there's a character limit on these forums WHO KNEW (gdoc)
I should mention to @discrider @AustinP0027 @joshgotro that I'm still up for starting the PBP from last year back up again whenever.
I'm leaving on vacation Saturday and will be gone for a week without internet, but when I get back, I'm all for jumping back in.
So, to simplify, in my Dark Heresy campaigns the god Malal did exist and was part of the big four way before Slaanesh existed. He was a god of banality and personified the recursive nature of Chaos. They beat him up, spread his essence out, and it congealed into forming the warp storm in the 2E fluff, the Pandaemonium. All the factions want to manipulate the pandaemonium using ancient xenos tech that could have destroyed the warp storm or harnessed its power but that old race was destroyed before they could use it. The main antagonist group, the Tarot, performed the steps necessary for this god stuff to be released, setting most of the plot into motion
We have warring for it:
The Inquisition with squabbling factions.
A Dark Eldar archon.
The Tarot, a huge entrenched sector wide conspiracy comprised of mercenaries, renegades, and Chaos (except Nurgle) led by an ultra charismatic, manipulative, and powerful being.
The Bilious Legions, a huge entrenched Nurglite conspiracy.
They will war for different pieces of that old race’s ancient weapon. The acolytes will trek across the Askellon sector meeting monsters, assassins, the horrors of the warp, and ancient shit that was not to be disturbed. I’m calling it God Dust Crusaders. I thought this whole thing up two years before I had even watched JoJo. I did not realize I had given the arch-villain what essentially is a stand until I thought about it a couple days later.
Yes please.
Law and Order ≠ Justice
ACNH Island Isla Cero: DA-3082-2045-4142
Captain of the SES Comptroller of the State
It read to me like a very simplified Cortex (Firefly, Marvel Heroic, etc.) game, though I've heard Savage Worlds uses a similar resolution system if that helps. Traits have a die rating (d4-d20) that you roll against a difficulty score. If you have a relevant Talent then you can add that die to your roll as well. There's also a meta-currency to help you out of a jam. In terms of content issues it's mostly fine but does include some light combat ('Scuffling').
The book is very much written from the perspective that kids will be reading it, but that might make it a frustrating read for adults. Overall I find it a little too simplistic, but for a 7 year old it's probably about right.
The premise is the heroes have been transported from across the multiverse to take part in a race to the top of a fairy king’s tower.
You can be anything, so long as you can afix it to the classes of Dungeon World. Dark elf cleric of night? Okay. Robot Robin Hood? Definitely.
Think Into the Spiderverse, Timesplitters, Planescape, Guardians of the Galaxy, just a really gonzo dungeon crawl.
It’s called Glamjin’s Tower of Glory and it’ll start properly once I have four players, but for now it’s just a thread to chat about and design your characters, and tell me what you’d like to see.
https://darkheresychainsofmalice.blogspot.com/2019/01/dark-heresy-21-fan-patch-in-work-big-wip.html
Suggestions or comments welcome. Some of it might only make sense to someone who knows the system, but I feel a good chunk of it could be understood by anyone with passing knowledge in TTRPGs.
Starring Ifrit from the Devil May Cry series
Added a google docs version of 2.1 with an index and page numberings along with a few readability changes as a link on the blog. It should be easier to read.
I'm on break from GMing with smatterings of playing DnD 5E. It's fun. Have yet to bring out Katt Dogg.
How have y'all games been
Most of this was totally incomprehensible due to not knowing the previous rules you were changing, but I like your chase rules - I did something similar to the first paragraph of that myself, and your extension of that looks pretty solid. Same goes for dropping things.
2 points per fervor action seems really low since the costs are 10-30. Somebody's gonna get really annoyed referencing their character's religion ten times to earn enough points to do something. I would probably change it to +5 points per action, max +10 per session, and make them do something more elaborate RP-wise to get it. Also, this lets you divide all the numbers by five which is always nice.
On the line "-Overwatch can be activated only up to a number of times equal to total Perception or Agility bonus, whichever a character chooses" - This should just be "whichever is higher" because only a goose would pick a lower number.
This line "-Engagement is not automatically activated upon entry to a character's Area of Engagement unless that character is in a defensive stance, a held melee action has been activated, or the character entering the Area is attacking with melee." is repeating yourself since you laid out each method to enter engagement earlier in the section.
It did not help that I didn't reformat the thing until later and the google doc is a lot easier to read, also yeah looking at it now, you really need the core rulebook. I even added it later.
I think that forces them to roleplay. Fervour already verges on being more fate points so I feel it needs to be harder to get.
It's me being me but I like how that sounds better. Also it can't be misread as the GM having the choice over the player. I know how semantic that is, but I literally made this thing based off a bunch of semantics and additions and changes I wanted after five years of GMing.
I like the repeat because it is a summation. I am very big on clarification. I think like half of the overhaul is clarifications.
Then they do not get the extra resource.
I felt there needed to be a resource for berserk and zealous types similar to the faith powers of 1E's splat Blood of Martyrs. There needed to be something more than frenzying. It is assymetric between player and npc.
If they were not going to do it, then they won't, or they would not be playing characters where you are assumed to roleplay a specific way like a Ministorum priest or Sister of Battle which even in vanilla suggests you play them in a certain way.
I am changing it to +5 with a max of +15 per session though. 10 is too little.
With some more lore-based powers like a high amount of points being used to do something like stun a demon for a turn which has happened in lore with Euphrati Keeler in the Horus Heresy and once when daemons were hesitant to cross a sanctified cemetary for a moment.
https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/14/hacker-strikes-again/
thank you very much
https://darkheresychainsofmalice.blogspot.com/2019/02/homebrew-homeworld-beastman.html
these are technically sanctioned mutants used by inquisitors rather than the Warhammer Fantasy pillage, murder, and wipe shit everywhere ones.
So the fun thing is coming up with alternate beastmen species that give different characteristic modifiers and special abilities. For example, Wolfmen get Pack Attack making them count as two characters in respect to ganging up bonuses when two characters are fighting someone in melee. Bullmen get Red Rage and that gives bonus damage on charges. Ratmen get Rat Bastard and that gives them easier criticals on surprise rounds.
Making beastmen, what abilities and characteristics would you give them based on the animal they've partially mutated into?
One of my players tried to psychically crush a guy flying through the air in a MGS4/Ironman style mechanized armored warsuit when I was basically offering them a preview of future bosses fighting the villains' rival group. Those guys were there for story reasons, for them to know what they were going up against next adventure, and as flavor for the event unfolding. These bosses were supposed to notice the players were there, let them know they knew they were there with a tip of a hat or a smug grin or something, and then go off into the battle happening around because the big bad group wants the player group there. Luckily they couldn't because they were out of range for the player's new character's psychic power. The main villain group wants them to take out another rival villain group in the natural prosecution of their work. Had that psychic power worked and the pilot was wounded or even died, they would have had to face all fifty of the mooks on the ground, the daemons of the rival group, and two powerful lieutenants including one who basically has The Darkness and the other that has the instant teleportation and moveset of Vergil but faster. Also if that guy survived, a warmachine suit with missiles, gatling guns, and bladed "wings" on it.
That was just setup to let them know the battlefield is going to be really busy for them to rescue hostages an important NPC wants saved so they could run through it and face some conflict in their own little bubble of structured time but not like the whole shebang.
Like woo, tempting fate there. He has seemingly forgotten he is playing someone more squishy and not the Dark Heresy Goku of the team anymore.
I’m just thinking about it right now, but it’d be more Oxenfree, Stranger Things, Night in the Woods, a bit of Sabrina and stuff rather than Twilight.
Theme song under the cut.
That sounds really cool, how would you be doing it? Besides a more standard monster hunting Supernatural/X-Files thing like Hunter, I always thought something where you’re playing as highschool or college aged students way out of their depth on the supernatural would be fun.
MH’s rules are all about the social interaction between the characters (and they’re great rules), but I’m an old hat with Apocalypse World derived games so I’ll be making a lot of moves up on the fly to accommodate sneaking around and investigation.
My main idea is to run it like a cheap 90’s evening show, Buffy for instance. It’d be episodic, with an undercurrent of some conspiracy or bad judu in the town that comes to a head by the end.
I’m not thinking monster fights, at least not right until the end. Some episodes might not even have a villain, some might even just be the characters hanging out or dealing with a real problem.
You’re not monster hunters, or even really monsters yourself... you are... supernatural conduits, weirdness magnets, you make contact with stuff no one else is seeing.
Lastly, the plot is also made up a lot on your end, nothing stopping you being evil if you want. It’s still Monster Hearts after all.
Also how old would the characters be and where generally would it take place?
I might be able to bring out Tommy Kraut, brazen punk scam-artist.
I’ve got two groups I run games for already so I wouldn’t want to throw too much time into it.
I’m thinking daily posts, but post when you can being totally fine. Weekends off.
Since it’s not a party based game if me and a player are on at the same time we can smash through a one on one scene real quick.
I guess 16 years old would be about right for this kind of thing.
Location I’m not sure on yet. Could even put it to a vote. Somewhere America, rural, I’ve got an idea that requires a fairly new town.
Penny Arcade Rockstar Social Club / This is why I despise cyclists
How does that work with the MH playbooks? (I've never played Monsterhearts but am interested.)
You’d be a human first, monster second, maybe with no origin for why you’re becoming these things. Like you were human until a couple days ago.
Again, this is all concept stage.
My main thought is you’re figuring yourself out, your character doesn’t know what playbook you picked.
Nice one. I’ll set up a recruitment thread (which will then be the in-character thread once we start) on Thursday at the earliest.
We will be using the second edition, which is actually more of a errata, with a nice section on player boundaries and a few rough edges smoothed off. First and second are very much the same game for those that have only played first edition MH.
No one will need the MH book to play, I could easily fill you in on the playbooks (classes in D&D terms), and the basic moves without it even being “stealing”. The playbooks and basic moves have been free online from the beginning.
Also I got tree hundred views on me and my buddy’s overhaul. Yey. 200 views on the catgirl homebrew (felinids) and 20 on beastman. Mmmhmm *sideeyes 40k RPG reddit*