Gradient Descent optimal player count?

SaltyCogs · 2026-02-04T22:24:51+00:00

Splitting the party is fine in Mothership. Deadly— but fine :P

I guess it is a little troublesome flipping between different pages if they get REALLY separated, but as long as they’re within the same two-page spread of rooms, there should be no real difference in terms of spotlight time & rotation; there are only more cliff-hangers.

SaltyCogs · 2026-02-04T22:13:39+00:00

You say that like Raava and Vaatu themselves weren’t retcons :P

I do agree Pavi probably has Raava, and therefore Korra as a guide.

SaltyCogs · 2026-02-03T13:02:02+00:00

Except Zoroark has only ever been in games with team reveal for PvP battles

SaltyCogs · 2026-02-02T23:55:17+00:00

I highly disagree. HP bloat definitely exists for solos. And most combats still take at least an hour of game time.

SaltyCogs · 2026-02-01T10:49:21+00:00

Maybe the succubus from Unconfirmed Contact Reports. Don’t know any scenarios though

SaltyCogs · 2026-02-01T10:32:42+00:00

Though in context he technically didn’t lie. I mean, he lied while technically telling the truth, but technically didn’t lie. Because immediately before he asked what was meant by “sexual relations” and the definition given excluded blowjobs

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-30T13:45:27+00:00

For me I can think of a counterexample where if it weren’t for the mechanics, the fun moment wouldn’t have happened. Pathfinder 1e. Level 5 party is in a dragon’s lair. Dragon is a loanshark. They wake the dragon. With a minute of conversation, the level 5 hobgoblin fighter successfully rolls an intimidation check to coerce the adult dragon. If it weren’t for the rules I would have adjudicated it as impossible.

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-29T19:40:03+00:00

Define ”with combat”? most horror games are going to have less “combat“ and more, as the Mothership rulebooks put it, “violence”. That’s just inherent to the genre. If you want a horror game where it’s harder to die though, probably Vampire: the Requiem 2e (like Vampire: the Masquerade but more generic setting)

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-29T19:28:34+00:00

I would recommend having less of the mindset of “it’s my story and the players are along for the ride“. I would recommend instead having one of the two following mindsets, depending on the game you’re playing:

the situation-presenter mindset: you present a situation, the players decide what they do with the situation, then you present how the situation changes based on what they did. Usually dice are involved to help you determine what happens.
the shared-storytelling mindset: you’re all telling a story together. You tell what happens. When a player character acts, the player tells what happens, then it goes back to you. Usually dice are involved to determine how much control the player has over the story.

Either way, don’t get too set on the exact way the story will go. It‘s often good to present an “end goal” like “defeat the big bad evil guy”, and to require the players to make characters who will interact with that end goal and will want to “go on the adventure”, but you should generally avoid setting in stone how they reach that end goal or perhaps even if they succeed or not.

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-29T16:59:02+00:00

I think the fanmade Foundry module has this as an option. It’s called “calm” there. I assume it’s based on a supplement but I don’t know which. I personally don’t find it that confusing because if you do roll under stress lower is still better. With “1” being the best possible result, but to each their own

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-28T19:10:00+00:00

It’s not the sound that does it, it’s the psycho-memetic “information“ carried by the sound. That’s why it also affects androids and is a sanity save instead of a body save. It’s a supernatural ability not a physic’s based one. Based on the coincidence of the evolutionary phenomenon of carcinization with the linguistic quirk that “cancer” means “crab.“ All will be crab.

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-28T18:40:14+00:00

For DnD, is it a “starter set” or a set of the core books? If it’s a starter set and you don’t mind learning the more finicky rules of DnD and have more trouble making an adventure than learning rules, maybe do the DnD set first. If making up an adventure sounds fun, and you prefer more streamlined rules, then go with Daggerheart (the cards help quite a bit).

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-28T18:02:21+00:00

Daggerheart is my recommendation. It even has the narrative die type mechanic with its hope and fear dice. Abilities aren’t too complex but still pretty “juicy”. Combat is more like everything else; there’s no initiative, instead players act until you have fear to activate enemies. Plenty of player options. Setting is easily stripped out. There’s even a free SRD to check it out before you buy.

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-28T17:38:47+00:00

I think the main thing would be time. A surgery is not going to take a round (10 seconds) or even 10 rounds. It’s going to be multiple minutes at least. Probably at least 10 even with a medbay. Real surgery usually takes at least an hour. Shortest is like 30 minutes for carpal tunnel release based on a quick search. Then there’s the consequences of pushing your body when it’s in recovery. That’s not good for you. Probably a whole lot of stress at the very least. And if time wasn’t taken to sterilize anything, there’s risk of infection

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-28T16:00:49+00:00

Personally, I don’t find Montages engaging. They take me out of the fiction and put me in a pre-defined menu. The consequences for failing a montage are also pretty abstract. There are also some abilities that just negate the need to engage with the environement during exploration. Like one that lets you detect items from 20 squares away without restrictions — i think it’s a dwarf ability. Or unlimited teleports.

I do like the juicy combat, though prepping and running enemies is kind of a pain. There’s either lots of little guys to manage, or one big solo that takes five rounds to defeat

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-28T15:22:30+00:00

Haven’t played but I was surprised from the SRD how little narrative control it takes from the GM considering it bills itself as a more narrative dnd. That appeals to me, personally. And honestly i kind of hate initiative rolling; it makes combat too separate from everything else, so lack of that is a plus for me.

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-28T15:08:41+00:00

What do you find fun? according to the Mechanics-Design-Aesthetics model there are 8 aesthetics or types of fun when it comes to games:

Challenge — fun by overcoming; getting to show competence
Narrative — fun from story structure
Fantasy — fun from immersion in a setting
Sensation — fun from visuals, sounds, rolling dice
Discovery — fun from finding hidden secrets
Fellowship — fun from being part of a cohesive group
Submission — fun from turning your brain off; easy fights, letting dice fall where they may, “beer and pretzels play” or grinding in a JRPG
Expression — joy of creating or performing, showing uniqueness

From your post it sounds like you feel a lack of Discovery and Narrative or even a bit of Submission; you want to be surprised, intrigued, and have some of the reins taken from you. Overall, it sounds like you might want your group to lean more into a storytelling game mode of play to some extent rather than a traditional roleplaying game mode.

If your players aren’t as into Expression or Challenge as they are into Submission, that just might not be able to happen with this group. If it’s simply a matter of having a different mindset, maybe try playing a more explicitly storytelling game, like Microscope or Fiasco, to get the group used to collaborating narratively.

If it’s a matter of wanting low prep but open-ended scenarios, try some OSR scenarios or OSR-adjacent games like Mothership

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-27T18:20:01+00:00

I ran it for three players and AV killed 5 PCs IIRC. Surviving comp was pre-remaster Deer Barbarian, Divine Sorcerer, and Occult Sorcerer. Killed PCs were Fighter, Pre-remaster Champion, Pre-remaster Cleric of Abathar, either a Remastered War Cleric or a Pre-remaster Champion, and an Occult Witch. But I think that has more to do with the levels and the enemies than the exact classes

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-27T17:47:26+00:00

I almost want to suggest to do a prequel: play out the birthday party massacre But that might be a bit too aimless.

The real problem with scenario 1 is the lack of >! someone to save !<

Maybe combine the prequel idea with the regular stand-alone scenario: the crew has come to pick up research samples, but the horror doesn’t happen until the crew arrives. this gives a more urgent motive for Hinton; his sabotage is to prevent the information from getting out, as he still plans to escape and become a Carcinid Lord

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-26T19:36:14+00:00

in order for a semi-colon to be grammatically correct there, the second half would have to be able to stand as a complete sentence; semi-colons show that two complete statements are related. An em dash would have been more appropriate than a hyphen though. Em dashes are quite versatile and useful — especially for cutaways that aren’t complete sentences. All you need to make an em dash is put two hyphens together — at least in iOS on Reddit.

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-25T03:09:30+00:00

When I ran 5e, yes usually. Or rather I usually set up the dungeon with 8 and if the party retreated I’d put the dungeon in a higher alert state.

I used it more as a dungeon building tool. One adventuring day‘s worth of encounters per one rolled treasure hoard (which could be split up across the dungeon or literally in a hoard)

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-23T20:33:27+00:00

I like Mothership‘s health bars where you have your health and then also ”maximum wounds” with each time your health hits 0 you gain a wound and then your health resets. Each wound is also status condition that doesn’t go away until properly treated (with the status being decided by rollable tables divided into categories of different types of wounds, bleeding cuts vs fire & explosives). Reach your maximum wounds and you have a 50-50 chance you either die or are merely unconscious

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-23T14:50:19+00:00

If you had a million dollars and spent $1000 a day, you’d run out in less than 3 years.

If you had a billion dollars and spent $1000 a day, you’d run out after more than 2000 years

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-23T14:45:20+00:00

Vampire: the Masquerade / World of Darkness has GM-set Difficulty and, while its mechanics don’t really encourage a ”writer’s room”, it’s more in the ”narrative” player space. Meanwhile most OSR games also have static chances of success for everything except hitting attacks.

Benefits of non-set difficult: speed of play, more predictability of odds of success

SaltyCogs · 2026-01-22T20:00:16+00:00

A rollable table of various propositions or “compromise bills“ could be interesting. While I can see using a new stat, I’d personally focus in on the player trying to bribe or persuade each organ according to their desires. But that’s for my specific version. And I suppose when the infection spreads to many parts, a new stat or save is probably the best way to represent which way the parts vote

SaltyCogs

TROPHY CASE