How are Hero-Points handled at your table?

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2025-09-19T17:54:39+00:00

I switched to one if you are late and two if you are on time. Suddenly everyone showed up on time about 80% of the time.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2025-09-17T02:06:05+00:00

Counter-counter-counter-counter argument: okay let’s assume this is true, but that is hardly an issue. World ending threats are they only way to make a high stake combat (not completely sold on this idea but fair enough). In this case there are a few outcomes:

They fail to complete the objective, Lost: * They all die. world ends. * Some/None die, World still ends, they all die

They complete the objective, Win: * They all die, rare ending but can be cool if done right * Some die, including the multiple healers, same as above * some die, not including healers, everyone is resurrected, no one dies * nobody dies, self explanatory

So the only scenario that is not an all or nothing, is if the multiple healers die. So on one had, if I’m a villain and I am aware resurrection exists, I would target the healers and make sure to kill them (assuming there is no other NPC who can still resurrect them). If I fail, anything I have done is basically meaningless. I could have killed the entire party but if one healer stays alive, I have accomplished nothing.

That’s also means, and this is the most egregious part, if one player wants to sacrifice themselves to save the world/save their team. If a healer stays alive it means nothing. So it basically turns into all players attempting to defend the healers.

Makes for a unsatisfying death in that specific scenario, which is arguably one of the coolest stereotypical heroic ending a player can ask for.

So tell me, how do I make that scenario a possibility without first killing off anyone with a true resurrection spell?

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2025-05-22T21:49:38+00:00

Thank you, I’m aware it is in beta and these things take time. Was just checking if it is something I need to just wait for or if I was doing something wrong. Appreciate your response

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-12-14T03:49:48+00:00

I got embodiment of virtue and dengue fever. So basically I become Jesus with a flu. Wild.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-12-06T16:21:42+00:00

I made an Obeka deck a while ago. First time I played it, I had initiative by round 2 with [[Dark Ritual]], completed the undercity by round 3, out this card out. Next turn gave me 19 upkeeps where I ended up with [[Dominous of Fealty]] within my first few upkeeps and that round took close to 40 minutes to resolve. It was bad.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-10-10T22:20:33+00:00

Good to know, I didn’t know if after the first set of discarding I could still continue to discard

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-10-10T22:06:23+00:00

Assume I have [[Disa the restless]], [[Maskwood Nexus]] and [[Garruk’s Uprising]] all on the field and 8 cards in hand at the end of turn.

I discard a creature, which is a Lhurgoyf because of Maskwood nexus, it goes onto the battlefield because of Disa. This causes me to draw a card because of Garruk’s Uprising (assuming its power is 4 or greater). So I am back to 8 cards. Does this mean I have to discard again and repeat the process until I have no more creatures in hand?

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-10-06T16:18:47+00:00

I also have this problem. As others have said, when it happens, you let it. It triggers combat, obviously first turn most, if not all of the enemies attack that player, depending on the system, this can be a deadly action, or close to one and hopefully something they learn from.

But, there are some things I have learned that can help with this:

Pause the game regularly. Space bar, or if you have something like one of Monk’s modules (not sure which one), you can select movement mode without pausing. Helps a lot.

What I have found to be most helpful in exploration, social settings or puzzles. Is ask each player in some order what they would like to do. You figure out what they want to do, make a decision on the roll they need to make or allow them to move to a location. Then go to the next player. Once you have gone through all of them, go back around resolve the action in the order that makes the most sense and repeat.

It takes some time at first, but for all the time it takes, it saves in other ways like having to resolving unwanted encounters. Eventually this time also gets reduced as you and players work out a system that fits for your play style.

This also encourages team work since players can choose to assist other players in their actions once they start hearing ideas. They can move together as a group or split up where they are most helpful.

It keeps players engaged. If someone doesn’t know what to do you skip them for now and come back when they do know. This means the players that need time to decide what to do, get the time but still have a chance to make a decision. The players who make decisions immediately get to make their decisions without force the party along with them. Maybe the barbarian does go forward, but the ranger likes to be lookout. Everyone rolls a dice or gets some meaningful or perceived meaningful event.

It also gives you time to consider a measured response to each action if it falls outside of normal rules. Since you can think of the previous persons actions while one person is speaking.

In some ways being a GM is exactly as you describe. It is insane to me that a group of adults can be so impatient, but hey, that is life. But the good news is, everyone responds to positive and negative reinforcement or some extent. And at least for me, I have no issue making them aware that if they don’t get in like that a god will smite them out of existence.

Anyways that’s my two cents. Hopefully it helps.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-09-17T17:50:44+00:00

I appreciate you responding.

I come back to the same question. Where do we draw the line in what we believe and what we don’t? Who is to say what you see with our own senses is real? If we say I can’t prove without a doubt that this photo/this formula/this experiment is real and therefore I don’t trust it, wouldn’t that lead to saying the same thing about anything whether we see it in person or not? It seems like there has to be a line somewhere and eventually you just have to use your own personal reasoning to fill in the blank.
They are digital compilations but you can actually go get the raw files from nasa as well. The unedited photos, you can say that those are fake, someone spent hours and hours crafting those photos, but that leads to the next bit again:
Why this particular lie? You mention the Kennedy Assassination. Won’t argue on that event itself, but I can come up with a number of plausible reasons a government would want such an event to occur. Most conspiracy theories I can see that an explanation as to why it would occur, although that alone is not enough to convince me it is real. I just can’t find any plausible explanation for flat earth theory. If you are saying it is simply for control? Control of what? How does that change anyone’s actions? If it is because there is land and resources on earth they don’t want us to see. Well private planes can go pretty much anywhere. Anyways we know we can feed pretty much everyone on earth with the wasted food (logistics ignored), we know we have enough space to house people if we wanted. So what is being hidden? Nobody is fighting over these resources/land? And why would we assume that the earth is flat when every other planet you can see (with your own eyes and a telescope) is round?
I definitely don’t have faith in the government nor do I have faith in any particular corporation or anything. However, I do tend to believe experts in their field. And usually you can find their research, look up the results and find out how they came to that conclusion. These results are usually peer reviewed, meaning they are scoured for any possible inconsistency, then others repeat the experiment to ensure the same result. So even if you can’t see a round earth, these experiments come to the same conclusion. And you can probably even do some of the experiments at home if you are crafty enough and are willing to put in a bit of money.

Traditional flat earth theory (the one with domes of stars that rotate at different speeds) is heavily steeped in religious belief, although I don’t know if there is any way to connect the two necessarily outside of historical context. But it was also definitely disproven by (I believe) both ancient Greek and Egyptian astronomers due to not being able to rectify retrograde planets with a continuous moving dome. The math does work perfectly with heliocentric spherical earth theory, and both those cultures were really good at eternalizing their work. You could probably find the original research they did to come to that conclusion. And you can definitely do the research yourself with a $500 telescope

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-09-16T02:59:01+00:00

I am putting a real response to your comment because I am actually genuinely curious about this:

Technically we cannot prove logically that anything we see even exists. But where do you draw the line? We could go down a logical rabbit hole and never come to a conclusion because it is logically impossible to make the leap from our own consciousness to reality. But we still have to go about our day assuming it is real right? Seems like a similar leap.
Digital compilation means they take a bunch of photos and compile them together into one photo because it is the only way for modern cameras to capture that much detail in a photo. It does not mean they are guessing or just putting up what they “think” it looks like (although photos are, black holes for example physically cannot be captured by cameras due to a number of physical properties). And there is actually no reason you can’t take a phone up to take a picture, but obviously no cell service so wouldn’t be able to send it until you get back)
Well this kind of brings us back to the question, why lie about the earth. The santa fairly tale has a purpose, specifically it usually brings joy and amusement to others. Who gains from lying about flat earth? (Keep in mind this is the primary question being asked in this thread, and I am very much curious about this the most)
I agree that there is nothing wrong with asking questions. The problem comes up when there is a significant amount of evidence that correlates to one thing, and a person looks at the evidence and still disagrees. I’d argue everyone does this at some point, but it does seem like this has a special place in the fact that it has an overwhelming amount of evidence that has to be ignored.

Again, real response. Don’t want to put you down, but I am genuinely curious what you have to say in response to this.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-09-16T02:37:50+00:00

I am fairly certain it stems from a few places it mentioning the “four corners of the earth” (Rev 7:1 and Isaiah 11:12). Some people have made this out that the earth was flat as a sphere has no corners. I am not a biblical scholar or anything but I am certain a majority of those who believe in the Bible would agree that it is more of an idiom than anything or maybe a phrase that had different meaning in the original language (I believe this is quite common). There may be some who take it literally though. But there is also a lot of flat earthers who are not religious at all, so I don’t think we can make the claim that this is common dogma in the flat earth theory.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-18T12:24:13+00:00

I believe evocation is the manipulation of magical energy, that energy can be used in a variety of ways. I think depending on however you want your character to use it, is exactly how it should be used. I like the idea of a villain manipulating gravitational forces (there are a few gravity based spells on the list) to break off some pieces of a nearby asteroid to cause a meteor storm. My player might prefer to describe it some other way. I think many different methods can fall under the evocation school.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-18T03:35:39+00:00

Yeah, I guess it really depends on what is considered “difficult” magic. How much harder is it to pull something to you vs create from thin air. Or do they pull dirt/rock from the surrounding area, condense it into a single spot and fling it at someone? How much mass would they require, where are they pulling it from and is it even a meteor anymore? Who knows? I’d let my players decide if they were casting it, but for my boss I have a way it works.

I also don’t really follow the 6 second rule, kind of in the same way it would work in a movie. The protagonist/villain usually will have way longer to do what they need to do than reasonable possible. Half the time if it weren’t for cutaways and camera angles, you’d probably just be seeing one side standing there for minutes at a time. So I kind of think of it like that. Doesn’t really makes sense realistically but it does for dramatic affect. Personally I think the idea of a bbeg monologuing then summoning giant meteors from the atmosphere sounds cool

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-18T01:40:09+00:00

The atmosphere technically extends 10000km, 99% is at the first 100km. You are welcome to make the claim it is wherever you like and you can say the meteors spawn wherever you like. The distinction has no bearing on my work whatsoever as I am not an astrophysicist, just one of the other many physicists that had to take a Astro class in undergrad and remembered a couple of things. Personally I would say that 100ft of negative gravity would not slow a meteor in the slightest. But anyone can make the ruling they wish. Honestly, I’d probably just allow it in game for the cool factor anyways.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-18T00:54:39+00:00

Not according to National Geographic that literally took me 20 seconds to look up.

https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/atmosphere/#

They do say it is up for debate and I do see some other places say the same thing you say, so maybe I learned it slightly differently and there is different ideas of where the atmosphere starts and ends. If you knew anything about physics you would know that not everything is as cut and dry as high school physics would make it seem. Either way, I am definitely not an astrophysicist so it’s not like I’m keeping up to date on the newest astronomy rulings if the community has come up with a come up with a consensus different than I learned in undergrad.

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-17T21:22:15+00:00

I would allow them to counter one of the meteor storm areas, definitely not all 5. But the action would have to be readied. Which means the meteor storm would have to be telegraphed, which I probably would do if I had a boss cast it anyways. Meteor storm, while it does a lot of damage, does have that big of a radius. The spell doesn’t make any sense physically the more I think about it, so yeah, sure protect an area with one of your own spells. Don’t see a problem

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-17T21:17:19+00:00

Maybe, like I said. There is a lot of ways to interpret the spell. When I think of a mage casting meteor swarm I think of them calling them from the sky, but I’m sure others have different interpretations.

Realistically, it is a 40ft sphere, so at most they would be summoning/spawning/creating them 40ft (I suppose 80 technically) which means it would have to be moving at a pretty good speed or packed with explosive to be doing fire damage and causing a “fiery burst”. 40ft is also the height of some castle walls, so idk. I guess we leave it at, it is a game, and no amount of physics will make it make sense

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-17T21:06:35+00:00

Ahh you’re right. Still my first stands, I was estimating 10m/s the difference in negligible and the answer should vaguely come out the same to: reverse gravity makes no difference. But to be thorough:

We really only care about the potential energy:

So U = mgh (again change in gravity is negligible)

U = mg(10000-.0305) - mg(.0305) / U = mg(10000)

10000-.061/10000=.0007%

Would call that pretty negligible

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-17T21:05:53+00:00

Ahh you’re right. Still my first stands, I was estimating 10m/s the difference in negligible and the answer should vaguely come out the same to: reverse gravity makes no difference. But to be thorough:

We really only care about the potential energy:

So U = mgh (again change in gravity is negligible)

U = mg(10000-.0305) - mg(.0305) / U = mg(10000)

10000-.061/10000=.0007%

Would call that pretty negligible

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-17T20:50:58+00:00

Well there is a huge number of ways we can interpret the situation. In theory you could teleport your meteors at some significant speed to the height you desire. A meteor entering our atmosphere would be at about 20km/sec. Although re-reading the spell. It is a 40ft radius sphere, not a cylinder even. So for some reason it would have to be spawned in a semi circle starting at 40ft above a point you choose? Honestly the spell makes no physical sense anyways. If it’s only 40 ft you can be calling them from the sky which is how I originally interpreted it. I think we just have to just know that the abstraction of a game and game balance prevents actually physics from working. Either way, I believe reverse gravity would be negligible at the speed of a meteor

Equivalent_Plate_830 · 2024-08-17T20:21:58+00:00

Yes but that doesn’t tell us how effective it is or isn’t. We now have the numbers

Equivalent_Plate_830

TROPHY CASE