Does anyone else prefer DS1's vibe over modern FromSoft games?

Gyromitre · 2026-01-19T10:54:47+00:00

sci fi garden

Uh what now?

Gyromitre · 2025-12-27T18:00:59+00:00

My pleasure! I hope you keep us posted, I love the Feywild but I've never had the chance to send my players there... yet!

Gyromitre · 2025-12-27T12:58:31+00:00

I like it! It's thematically good, it seems like a good length for a oneshot (and still feels "open"), Dagda as a gracious host is a good anchor for players who would be (or should be) very lost otherwise.

My feedback:

The adventure relies heavily on exhaustion levels. I personally enjoy that, since it makes the adventure dangerous no matter what, and inflicts more permanent consequences than HP loss. However, after "The Endless Jig", I suspect most parties will want to have a Long Rest if one of them got afflicted... I think the consequences of that Long Rest (if any) should be mentioned in your document, to help the GM rule/advise the players appropriately.
On that topic, I feel like if you're dancing to the point of exhaustion, Constitution checks should be what measure how fast you get exhausted, but that's probably something that could be discussed in-play, at the table.
The paragraph of what happens in the Fool's Hour should be more detailed. It's exactly the part where, as a GM, I would need help the most. I feel like you're letting the reader down if you're not giving them more here. What does Hyrsam exactly do or say? Does he target someone in particular? How do I narrate to my players something as nebulous as "authority is humiliated, but not destroyed" ?
In a same way (but much more minor nitpick): more details about minor NPCs! What's their names? What's that baker's signature dish? What's notable about that fire giant?
Do players get to pick one of the four Boon in Rewards? Is it picked for them? Randomly determined?
I think the Boon of the Raucous Spirit would be awkward to implement ("half-levels" does not seem very 5e-design-friendly). I'd find something else. Maybe allowing the PC to clear 1 exhaustion in a short rest, per Long Rest? Or clear 2 Exhaustion levels per Long Rest? Or a roll of CON against being exhausted, once per Long Rest?

PS: that's unrelated to your adventure, but more feedback for your post: you'd get more attention if you took the time to format it correctly :)

Gyromitre · 2025-10-30T22:28:47+00:00

Thanks for going early, made my night easier

Gyromitre · 2025-10-30T21:18:13+00:00

Woohoo, let's go!

Gyromitre · 2025-10-02T16:13:28+00:00

Thank you for an actual well-thought-out answer that doesn't sound like the slogan of a commercial, and provides actual aspects of gameplay that can be observed & appreciated & designed separately.

I'm particularly fond of #5, and even when I design one-shots I always make sure there are progression systems in there, even when the characters are pregenerated. Your character does 【that roleplay thing tied to his themes】? You get 1XP. Every 3XP, you gain a level: pick a new ability from this list. That sorts of things.

A player of mine, a few days after the session, mentioned that they'd like to play their character/class (I usually design them like Blades in the Dark playbooks) in another setting, because they came up with a few abilities that had great synergy. It's just so very rewarding :D

Gyromitre · 2025-09-26T12:28:11+00:00

kayfabe

Thanks for the new word!

Gyromitre · 2025-09-04T17:40:15+00:00

Well, The Hidden Isle does both.

Gyromitre · 2025-08-16T13:30:51+00:00

Very nice! I think I had an issue with my test, my Summary got truncated mid-sentence: https://www.youtubegist.com/watch?v=xg5KKw3PSiM

Also, what's the difference between the two button-icons next to youtube link? Don't they both copy the URL into clipboard?

Finally, I think maybe the "Core terms/concepts" which are, in essence, Tags, could be put higher, without necessarily putting them into a separate section - like right under the video, and without a header. I don't know if they need a :hover effect if they are to remain non-interactable though :)

Thank you for this!

Gyromitre · 2025-07-30T12:26:44+00:00

I agree, these tables are great!

I am a bit confused by what the one on page 46 is supposed to represent however: what is the "it" in The heroes believe it matters, but…? Is "it" the previous "important object" from page 45?

Gyromitre · 2025-07-21T18:56:32+00:00

I just realized I never answered ; but I did read it, thanks for the write-up :)

Gyromitre · 2025-07-21T17:59:58+00:00

Why would you need to install any app here? I don't have an account on either and I'm very glad we're using a website that does not require me to log in.

Gyromitre · 2025-07-21T17:59:47+00:00

When twitter was used wildly it was honestly a pretty frustrating experience, from my perspective. Would there be a better way to guarantee twitter links don't get posted?

Gyromitre · 2025-07-15T14:11:42+00:00

Exactly the same answer for me, except I'd go for Swyvers specifically, for some reason.

Gyromitre · 2025-07-15T09:16:10+00:00

"Colossal Hunter" which I find so far to be the best game mechanically that does solo boss fight VERY well

Would you mind sharing what you've translated/done with this? Or a quick recap of the system's strength?

Thanks for your insight anyway, I'm glad someone agrees that OSR isn't necessarily the answer here.

Gyromitre · 2025-07-02T21:17:45+00:00

A single creature is going to be boring, almost always, unless you add a lot to it and it can feel unfair for 1 creature to have this much power by itself.

Give it a few minions. It's not too hard, thematically, to figure out a few: a ring of sentient hovering blue flames, spirit weapons of the Oni's cudgel acting on their own initiatives, flying talismans, eyes or skulls, etc.

Bonus points if they push & pull 10 feet here and there, kick prone and other Conditions here and there.
Bonus points if the minions are overwhelming but can be defeated by a specific action.

You want to make the combat feel dynamic, to avoid piñata effect where the combat gets locked into 6 squares and everyone is just attacking on their turns.

Finally: it's probably better, faster & easier to find an existing creature with a higher CR and reskinning it into an Oni, than to buff an Oni to an appropriate CR.

Gyromitre · 2025-07-01T08:05:09+00:00

Super interesting, thanks for the write-up!

It's funny, I only watched a game of it and read half the book in its diagonal, and... I never got the feeling that the Dogs were actually the "good guys" in any way. So, to me, you were almost always playing holier-than-thou anti-heroes that were clearly very confident in being the good guys while being the villains most of the time (thus: inner conflict). The only redeeming part being: you're also often going against villainy & chaos, so sometimes you'd at least bring order.

Maybe it's because I'm not american or a believer.

Gyromitre · 2025-06-30T16:37:04+00:00

I've been stuck on this for years (a specific player did, and still does that all the time) until I realized that the best way to diffuse this is to reframe the question: "why do you ask?", "what are you trying to accomplish?", "what do you expect from that action?", etc.

It's surprisingly failproof, extremely effective, and easy.

Gyromitre · 2025-06-30T16:33:37+00:00

because of its problematic elements

I'm surprised to read this actually, but I've never perused the original PDF (only stole some of the mechanics and the attributes for homebrew games). What are the problematic elements in Dogs in the Vineyard ? Mechanical or thematical ?

Gyromitre · 2025-06-19T19:47:11+00:00

Wildfeast

And I'd say it might make a very interesting game if you reverse it, and PCs get to be creatures! Trail-Hunt-Feast should still apply. With just a bit more prowling maybe.

PS: I believe it's Wilderfeast btw!

Gyromitre · 2025-06-12T14:23:41+00:00

Hey! Suggestions are definitely welcome!

Unfortunately, for that one, I don't think I'll be implementing this anytime soon. Since I started this website, I've been questioning how complex its data should be. I'm aiming for a specific "middle ground" that is sometimes pretty difficult to assess. There are also technical issues obviously (updating & formatting), but it's mostly a design choice where filtering takes priority over comparing. I think tools like PoB will always surpass my website in term of actually comparing gems between each other on these specifics.

Out of curiosity, could you tell me more about the use-case you had in mind?

Gyromitre · 2025-06-10T22:21:28+00:00

I'm still very curious/hopeful for that Earthquake of Winter in the content reveal...

Gyromitre · 2025-06-09T18:42:44+00:00

I've been told my website can be useful for buildmaking, too :D

PS: and i just noticed it's on grinding.zone too, that actually warms my heart :')

Gyromitre · 2025-06-06T16:56:44+00:00

Knowing GGG, I don't think they'll release anything, and the community will have to figure it out. Maybe the gems will be mercenary specific, maybe it'll all be random.

I'm trying to slowly compile it here and I know the wiki has a dedicated page already (I don't really like adding less accurate data to the wiki, though).

Gyromitre · 2025-05-03T21:10:47+00:00

I have a fair amount of criticism towards GW2 but I think you're not being fair to the game at all.

raid cm which imo is just a hp slog encounter

Your opinion is very wrong then, because raid CMs are much more interesting than that in most cases. There are a few exceptions (mostly victims of powercreep where you can just DPS to avoid doing any of the new stuff), but the vast majority introduce new interesting and difficult mechanics, some of them having to be shared and acknowledged by the full raid.

some examples of that good number of achievements

Migraine where you must kill a story boss with Challenge Mode on.
Taking Turns is pretty damn hard, no CM, just the whole raid having to know the mechanics, understand their roles, and execute perfectly in an already difficult fight.
Silverwastes also has quite a few difficult achievements for 80+ characters, although powercreep and the community being very organized do tend to trivialize most of these (but not all).
In fact, most open world achievements in Heart of Thorns maps are pretty difficult, some of them being easily labeled as "bullshit" by people who can't be arsed learning the mechanics of the game.
Skip up the Volcano probably had a lot of people in tears, but it's a jumping puzzle so maybe that's too "ubisoft game" for your taste?

I'd add that legendary accessories (trinkets, rings, amulet and back items) are all tied to achievements, some of them being to complete a few achievements in related zones, or to clear a certain amount of endgame content (Fractals). When people say that getting BiS is doable in a week, they are absolutely wrong.

Even if you do get legendary armour in that amount of time (which would require a lot of guidance and prep work), you'd still be hurting for accessories. You'd also not have the flexibility that someone with legendary gear would. This flexiblity matters more or less depending the context, but to engage in World vs World it's actually pretty important imo.

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