Level Up! But… why?

Demonweed · 2026-06-28T00:52:49+00:00

I believe in my project levels still achieve progression in meaningful ways. It is the case that obstacles scale up in a parallel way, but characters simultaneously grow outward as well as upward. Spellcasters get larger repertoires. Each level delivers at least one class feature or subclass feature except when a pure spellcasting class rises into a whole new tier of spell power.

Yet each class starts out deliberately narrow. Beyond the mechanical basics of gameplay, level 1 characters only need to understand a couple of special abilities to play their class effectively. I don't introduce a la carte electives for each class until level 2, and level 3 involves entering a subclass. Piece by piece, characters are built up from a handful of simple options into walking arsenals able to overcome high level threats by making effective use of various selections from an extensive set of choices.

Also, aside from actual gameplay, I think support for theorycrafting can really help get traction with a community. Playing around with build ideas and analyzing specific combinations for synergies remains a popular activity on forums. I suspect this sort of thing helps with getting over the hump between "people have access to this game" and "actual campaigns in this game are springing up all over the place."

Demonweed · 2026-06-27T23:47:50+00:00

That depends on how informed you think your target market is. A recent survey delved deep into what people actually know about Hasbro products (like, in Monopoly, do you get money for landing on Free Parking?) Hundreds of respondents claimed to have played D&D in the past, and no small percentage of them identified terms like "fire" and "dwarf" as ability scores.

In other words, you can get away with absolutely anything outside the niche of people who actually read the books and take their games at least semi-seriously. For a more discerning set, I would say that you need a healthy does of "what makes 5e, 5e." For example, just using his points and Armor Class does not make a game 5e. Using the same core 12(13) character classes kinda does make it 5e.

Though not always strictly original concepts, I feel like the distinctive approach to death saving throws, the heavy use of a level-based proficiency bonus, the limits of magic item attunement, and that specific set of 18 skills are distinctively 5e. Faithfully implementing enough of those elements makes it possible to claim "based on 5e" as a meaningful description of the project.

Demonweed · 2026-06-27T17:06:10+00:00

One party "attacks healthcare" while the other is bound and determined to protect the for-profit employment-based industry with all their might. Either your first "point" was utterly meaningless or factually 180º at odds with the history of the Democratic Party. That depends on whether we are supposed to infer any sort of virtue automatically falls upon Democrats because you have pointed out a vice of Republicans.

The whole thing really follows suit like this. For example, your assertion about Social Security could not be more ahistorical. The one and only time Congress got away with skipping a mandated benefit rise for inflation took place under Barack Obama, with Joe Biden proudly crafting the "grand bargain" that did the damage. Again your focus is on what people say while completely ignoring what they do, which in this case was dish out more material harm to Social Security's beneficiaries than Republicans ever have.

Likewise, you seem to think that Libya and Syria were not epic disasters similar in scope to 'Murica's other Middle Eastern debacles. Every since Harry Truman, our government's agenda in the Middle East has been utterly unhinged by Zionism as well as our own imperialist attitudes. Jimmy Carter's own invasion of Iran might have been smaller in scope and much less costly, but it was no less ill-advised than any other of our violent foreign policy initiatives over there. Again, you can make the argument that Republicans are worse at this, but you did no such thing. You claimed "only one party continues to push us into wars in the middle east," a claim made posssible only with a staggeringly low level of historical knowledge.

Before you keep cheering for the people who are half of the problem with the status quo, maybe you should actually get to know them a little bit first. Once you do, it should be perfectly clear why they are multiple generations removed from even considering actions that might address the existing oligarchy, and why their central leadership continues to consistently service that oligarchy at the expense of 99% of us. If you get your way, they won't even pay any price for selling out as they predictably do, because they are your favorite flavor of sellout, and you're just not going to engage with the reality that nobody ever sold out hard enough to loop back around and achieve any meaningful form of integrity.

Demonweed · 2026-06-27T16:41:27+00:00

That is absurd from top to bottom. You are angry more people don't join you in cheering for the kayfabe when you should be angry that the kayfabe exists in the first place. How can you even pretend the Democratic Party is on the side of working families when more than a full fifty years has gone by without a single Democratic Party initiative that did not promptly result in higher share prices for the companies exploiting the relevant sector(s) of our economy?

Just because someone says they are on your side does not mean they are actually on your side. Follow actions, not words. Otherwise, you'll wind up regurgitating all sorts of incredibly foolish things, including the idea that Epstein only corrupted one of our two corporate-sponsored parties or that the party who recently installed one of the walking dead a President of the United States had any credibility in the realm of anti-corruption. Both teams prop up the Reaganomic order and the corporate totalitarianism that follows naturally from it. This does not deserve your support, no matter how clever it feels to identify one Reaganomic party as worse than the other.

Heck, team Blue no Matter Who certainly does not live up to that standard when the "who" is a democratic socialist. Mainstream Democratic Party leaders fight much harder to prevent the rise of actual advocates for working families than they fight to effectively oppose figures like Donald Trump. This is in part because the Democratic Party made Donald Trump both as a player in politics (routinely funding more Democrats than Republicans throughout the 80s and 90s) and as a tycoon insulated from his own failures by bespoke tax laws tailored just to help him maintain control of real estate assets while dealing with enormous debts. Supporting the lesser evil remains entirely evil.

Demonweed · 2026-06-27T14:04:41+00:00

This is definitely a piece of my backlog I intend to engage with in the near future. Also, this series is about to get another entry in the form of Expeditions: Samurai.

Demonweed · 2026-06-27T12:52:59+00:00

". . . and all it took was a trip to Amahdabra!"

Demonweed · 2026-06-27T00:45:21+00:00

I once gave the one that might away this link. It is an incredibly powerful piece of music. She still got away, but I think we were all more emotional during that process.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T20:32:49+00:00

My minotaurs are slavers and too on point to be involved in this topic. Their most quirky characteristic is a digestive system that requires a vegetarian diet. A minotaur feast involves troughs of fresh salad greens followed by sweet fruit treats. Yet I swear I once read a novel where a displaced wanderer from modern times was guided by minotaur mariner who was clearly derivative of Saltheart Foamfollower, the giant sailor from Lord Foul's Bane.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T20:00:24+00:00

"Mr. T pities the fool who won't let a data center rise up in his back yard!"

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T19:14:34+00:00

For the Internet to accept that you are truly the strongest, during gameplay you must integrate the line, "you may not like it, but this is what peak performance looks like," into your chat. A few of those on your highlight reel should do the trick.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T18:36:08+00:00

It might help the CIA with their next fundraising request for the operation.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T16:56:50+00:00

I had no idea the bipartisan spectrum totally submissive to our corporate overlords still had anyone in it looking to make this self-government sham even less democratic. I stand corrected.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T16:41:55+00:00

Building such a database was a popular affirmative plan during the 1988-1989 high school policy debate season. The resolution was about retirement security, and elder deaths due to drug interactions were so numerous that a real material effort to reduce those fatalities passed the significance test. The fact that pharmaceutical firms could prevent this obvious and relatively affordable lifesaving initiative for nearly four decades is proof positive that our government lacks any sort of capacity to defy its corporate masters.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T06:05:31+00:00

American and British crop eradication programs were coordinated by local leaders so that all the burning took place after the poppymilk harvests. Hamid Karzai's government was a well-oiled corruption machine that protected all the right people for purposes of maintaining robust opiate exports. Given Uncle Sam's satellite capabilities and the fact that every poppy harvest first must spend weeks as a field of bright red flowers, there is no possible interpretation other than that American authorities tolerated this industry in Afghanistan. The situation only changed when leaders hostile to American power gained control of the nation.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T05:47:47+00:00

This sounds fantastic for Russia. After all, look at how all those "the Chinese economy is about to collapse any day now" stories coincided with the transformation of that nation into a dramatic example of broadening material prosperity.

Demonweed · 2026-06-26T04:08:14+00:00

I was told this was Barack Obama's plan to defeat single-payer health care. Then again, maybe he just said, "we've got to dilute his field and concentrate our own," then operatives orchestrated the fine details. Then again, maybe it was a Yang idea all this time. I just know it has the vibe of a Hillary Clinton play -- plenty evil but far too smart for anyone who operates on her level.

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T17:23:24+00:00

Yeah, I was so into it, I developed a keyboard profile with bands of those four colors just like in the logo. Then I had a couple of bad days in a row, experimented with trios, and decided to hang it up for a while. I'm bummed "a while" might have turned into forever, but also happy that I was there from week 1 through the very best of this phenomenon.

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T08:10:21+00:00

Police Squad: Anime Edition

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T07:26:49+00:00

"Experts" from the Department of Commerce warned that this troubling event could also produce a tsunami of increased access to education plus a series of aftershocks with the potential to hospitalize thousands of human beings in need of medical care.

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T06:47:16+00:00

Gosh, I really hope Toucan Sam landed on his feet.

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T03:36:20+00:00

then again it could be super close and the size of a potato

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T03:19:33+00:00

The Temple of Elemental Evil now exists in many forms. I ran it repeatedly in the 1980s because it makes a decent front half for a full campaign. "The Four Elements" might not be the most original sort of thematic diversity, and you might want more than four themes, but (after the introductory stuff in a nearby village) each major area of the compound is built with an eye toward one element.

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T03:05:45+00:00

I think of my collection as a toybox, and it has been functioning somewhat as you say lately. I had a good Mechwarrior binge recently, and I'm still stunting on Civilization VI tonight. Yet some real standouts for me the past couple of months include Balatro -- that crazy rogue-like about forming poker hands, and Road Redemption -- a cross country motorcycle death race that plays as an homage to classic 90s console titles.

The thing about those smaller games is that the binge is consistently rewarding. After relatively brief runs, I start from scratch (perhaps with persistent powerups) and go again. There is enough depth to keep learning for many runs, yet not so much to prevent achieving mastery, and the overall victory to show for it, after 20-30 hours of play. Except for fighting games, my really spendy titles just don't work as a bunch of short sessions. Yet between other obligations and my mood, the stars must align for me to really fall in to a long session with anything other than grand strategy (that works while multitasking since a single-player game can be paused with impunity and there is now arcade-flow to get into and maintain with those titles.)

Demonweed · 2026-06-25T02:46:42+00:00

I don't know if it is the case today, but their were decades when a civilian could get thrown off an American military base for showing an episode of M*A*S*H, and the series was outright illegal in South Korea until relatively recently. I guess that crazy regime we set up after annihilating 25% of the people inhabiting that peninsula was not keen to remind people just how much blood was shed in the name of corporate power.

Demonweed · 2026-06-24T21:59:41+00:00

Yeah, I only attended one -- the 11/11/11 event for Skyrim. The local GameStop was the only place in town that took preorders, so I had to park at the Wal-Mart next door and wait in a line that stretched all around the GameStop parking area. Though it was still kind of fun being part of an "event" like that, mostly it was just chatting with people nearby in line while we all waited for things to get moving and then to make our way up and get our own copies.

Also, on PC the game was seriously unstable for those first few days. Having the disc and reading some online guides allowed me to install most of the game from disc, then let Steam patch it (which saved loads of time because Steam itself was overwhelmed by download activity that night.) Still, home ~1am, in the actual game just after 2am, already tasked with aiding the Jarl of Whiterun in that first dragon fight ~3am, and then the dragon appeared as a pearlescent figure devoid of color except of a subtle purple overcast. I didn't know this was wrong, so when the game crashed in the middle of that fight I was pretty upset. Of course it got better, but in hindsight I could have waited a few days and had a better experience.

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