I honestly did not think people would care at all about my post from Saturday's West Marches prep, but it seemed to catch people's attention. I can post a bit more stuff. I'm 99% sure my players aren't on mastodon regularly (if you're one of my players, don't read this!)
#dnd#ttrpg#osr folks: I'm looking for a good supply of maps that would work for a long-forgotten city in a steaming jungle. I really just want the maps - I can make a normal dungeon map myself, but I'm less confident in above-ground ruined cities.
Any suggestions? I'm looking at Ruins of Adventure and Dwellers of the Forbidden City (gonna grab the pdfs online) but if you can think of anything that fits the bill please let me know!
Oh damn, I have just had a REVELATION regarding my West Marches game. I felt like there was a gap I could not figure out how to fill in the setting that justified more dungeon-crawling and danger. By gum, I've got it!! Something that lets me pepper the map with dungeon-like stuff that I had not considered before, and another genre of weird monsters.
@bwebster I'm thinking that there was a big falling out between the humans and the merfolk, and that's part of why both cities fell to ruin and obscurity. So now I get to sort out how exactly they walloped each other with their weird ancient magics. What cursed people still wander the halls of that lost city?
@nickdrawthing very cool! Even if itโs not applicable I always like to hear about other peopleโs gaming. You never know what might end up being inspirational
Trying to be a good gardener this year. We spent the weekend weeding and transplanting seedlings.
This morning I got up early and weeded and watered the plots and pots we planted. Watched the birds and squirrels ripping around the yard. Now it's time for a coffee before starting my day properly.
Soliciting more #westmarches advice! This time about NPCs.
My feeling is that West Marches games benefit from being outside of civilization and safety. Danger is the whole point. So it can be difficult to justify the existence of non-hostile NPCs in that setting without undermining the challenges upon which the whole format hinges.
@nickdrawthing I donโt run WM explicitly, but more general sandboxes, and for that NPCs (and factions) are super important. Theyโre one of the core pillars of a sandbox game in my opinion (https://archstonepress.com/2023/09/running-your-first-sandbox/). While WM has more focus on exploration, that doesnโt mean you canโt put NPCs in. In fact, I would argue NPCs are a core part of helping to show parts of this world the players are exploring. They can also be helpful for tying together the scattered adventures that make up a WM game
I was really hoping the solar storm would be powerful enough to knock us back to a previous save game so we could try again. Humanity failed too many checks and got the bad ending.
LMAO I had my first character romance in a tabletop game!! We were in a hoity-toity magic shop and the attendant made a comment about having a soft spot for "dwarves who are rough around the edges." So my dwarven character asked her on a date to see a rock concert we were planning to attend! It was awkward and hilarious and definitely felt more natural than I'd always feared this kind of thing might be. Lots of pithy one-liners helped ease the weirdness too!
No wonder Frodo decided to not stay at bag end. His house had a lot of baggage.
"This tea table is where Saruman set up shop. And this is where the cannibalism happened, in the corner under the window in the bedroom."
Are there any #ActivityPub blogging services that automatically slice up long posts into 500-character (maximum), threaded posts when you publish? I like the idea of an ActivityPub compatible blog but I know a lot of people (myself included) aren't wild about huge, 10K character posts showing up on their feed.
I can imagine a service like this that provides a clean looking article when viewed on the originating site, but provides threaded posts on the federated TL.
Maybe this already exists?
@nickdrawthing not quite what you are looking for, but the WordPress plugin for ActivityPub allows you to configure it so that it only posts the first 400 characters of a post, and then adds a link back to your blog to read the rest
As a reaction to enjoying the Fallout show I made the inadvisable decision to reinstall #fallout4. I've played that game so much the corners are all rounded off so to spice it up I've decided to play on survival difficulty without ever spending a level-up.
I'm at level 12 and I'm discovering that this might just be impossible. Nothing other than the level up are off the table, so I may have to start cheesing the economy to just buy some legendary gear. Otherwise I think this playthrough is sunk.
@Just_me honestly, while I'm not there yet, I have noticed my reaction time has gotten worse since my 20s.
I enjoy a lot of what survival offers, but I the lack of quicksave is punishing. I played for an hour tonight and died on every outing.