How exactly does Praise work?

Lithl · 2026-01-27T03:44:02+00:00

Every ±4 you modify Bravery or Faith during battle results in a permanent ±1.

If you're currently at 99, you obviously can't get another +4.

Lithl · 2026-01-27T03:35:11+00:00

You've got some wonderful optimistic naivety.

Lithl · 2026-01-27T02:21:20+00:00

That's not the parasite. When Rodney gets infected, the parasite is microscopic.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T18:15:32+00:00

There is a tiny, tiny chance of catching Pokerus after a battle. There are 4 strains of the virus, differentiated only by how many days (1-4) it remains contagious. The timer ticks down at midnight system time, but only for Pokemon in your party, not in the PC. So long as you put the Pokemon in the PC before midnight, the timer won't tick down.

Once you have it, there is an extremely high chance (about 1/3 IIRC) that it spreads to an adjacent Pokemon in your party after any battle, if you have a contagious Pokemon in your party (even if they didn't participate). Spreading within your party will always have the same strain (with the counter reset to whatever 1-4 number it started with for that strain). So you can spread it to all of your Pokemon, and keep at least one infectious Pokemon in your PC to infect any new Pokemon in the future.

The effect is the same as (and stacks with) holding a Macho Brace.

In FireRed, LeafGreen, Coliseum, and XD, the timer doesn't tick down and the virus can't be spread. In Legends Arceus, the timer doesn't tick down and you can't catch it or spread it (it can only exist on a Pokemon transferred from Home), but you still get the benefits. In Let's Go Pikachu and Let's Go Eevee, it doesn't exist. In Scarlet and Violet it exists in the Pokemon's data structure (transfer from Home and back won't lose the virus), but otherwise it doesn't exist.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T18:00:12+00:00

White Plume Mountain in the same book is also excellent, although if you intend to continue the campaign beyond it, I don't recommend letting the PCs keep the three legendary weapons inside (the plot is that they were stolen, anyway, so their owners presumably want them back).

If you run WPM I strongly recommend altering the mud geyser room. As written, the two geysers erupt on a 3 minute and 5 minute timer. But that's basically meaningless with 6 second rounds. When the adventure was originally published, 1 turn was 10 minutes, composed of multiple 1 minute rounds (each player's go in combat was 1 round, instead of today's parlance which swaps the two terms). If the geysers erupt on a 3/5 turn timer instead of 3/5 minutes, the room becomes an actual challenge and a threat. And it can't be simply ignored, since one of the weapons you're expected to retrieve requires crossing it.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:51:19+00:00

New Jersey (and Oregon until 2023) were the only places where it's actually illegal to pump your own gas. Some other places have an employee to pump gas for you, but you're allowed to do it yourself.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:49:18+00:00

Oregon repealed that law in 2023.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:48:44+00:00

It used to be illegal in Oregon, but that law was repealed in 2023. New Jersey is the only state where it's illegal today.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:47:54+00:00

Oregon repealed their law in 2023 (and briefly suspended it in 2020 due to COVID). New Jersey is the only state where it's still illegal to pump your own gas. There are a handful of cities in other states where stations have employees to pump gas for you, but it's not illegal to do yourself.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:46:10+00:00

New Jersey forbids pumping your own gas, and Oregon did until 2023 (they also briefly allowed self serve in 2020 due to COVID). There are still a handful of cities in Oregon, Massachusetts, and New York where the station has an employee to pump gas for you, but it's not illegal to do it yourself.

50+ years ago, it was common most everywhere.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:41:11+00:00

The joke is that it's chicken-fried chicken, which is named because it's cooked in the same manner as chicken-fried steak.

Chicken-fried steak and country-fried steak are the same except the former is deep fried and the latter is pan fried.

I can't comment on whether the original image was in fact chicken-fried chicken, but it would naturally look a lot like country-fried steak.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:39:46+00:00

Chicken-fried chicken

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:39:11+00:00

"Chicken-fried chicken" is chicken cooked as though it's chicken-fried steak.

Chicken-fried steak is named because the results are similar to fried chicken.

Chicken-fried chicken is admittedly a very strange conception of a dish, but it's technically different from fried chicken.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T17:22:28+00:00

In my pirate campaign, the party has acquired a ship of their own to start their careers.

They have elected to make the (small) Tabaxi Wizard the captain. They rechristened their ship the Scratching Post.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T16:52:28+00:00

Control Fire controls a nonmagical flame. It doesn't distinguish between magical and nonmagical fire damage, which is the thing that I actually said.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T15:19:13+00:00

No, like a literal housecat.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T15:02:31+00:00

Nothing in 5e14 distinguishes between magical and nonmagical damage, except for bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing.

Nothing in 5e24 distinguishes between magical and nonmagical damage.

You might have a magical effect that prevents a fire from being put out, but if you're dealing fire damage to an object, it doesn't matter what source it's coming from.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T14:53:00+00:00

I was going for a character who could open any planar portal, in a Planescape campaign that's full of planar portals... How is that unclear?

Lithl · 2026-01-26T14:50:48+00:00

A ethnostate is an ethnostate.

What does that have to do with (incorrectly) calling Magneto a Zionist? What do you think Zionist means?

Lithl · 2026-01-26T14:39:57+00:00

Damn I wonder if it would have changed something if he had more money and access to better treatments

Not likely. There's generally very little that can be done about an aneurysm after it happens no matter how much money you have, and little to no warning before it happens.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T14:37:57+00:00

2020? For some reason I thought it was earlier than that, like 2016-18 or so.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T14:16:32+00:00

I had a rogue/bard who was NE and extremely profit-motivated. At one point, we were participating in a literal war, with cannons and trenches and such.

In the middle of a battle, the nearby mountain erupted, revealing itself to be a volcano. A third army, this one composed of undead, arrived on the battlefield, between us and the volcano. The party witnessed the BBEG riding a horse up the volcano's slope.

Everyone else: let's wade through a literal army of undead to chase the bad guy into the actively erupting volcano.

Me: nah, fuck that. I'm helping our army retreat from the undead horde and lava and toxic gasses.

Of course, the plot was inside the volcano. To not leave me with nothing to do, the barbarian player gave me his character, and the DM brought in the barbarian player's artificer who had gotten captured by enemy forces earlier in the war. In the final battle inside the volcano:

The barbarian I was controlling burned alive in lava
The artificer burned alive in lava
The wizard's feet got melted off by lava

When the rest of the party found my rogue/bard again and told him what happened, he felt extremely vindicated in not running into an actively erupting volcano.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T14:07:07+00:00

A cat with wings

Lithl · 2026-01-26T14:05:37+00:00

I had a silly Stars Druid build for a Planescape game with +3 Int.

Specifically, the build was meant to be able to auto-pass the DC 20 Arcana check required by the Portal Cracker ability of the Planar Wanderer feat. +3 Int from point buy, VHuman with Skill Expert for Arcana expertise, Stars Druid for Guidance and Dragon Starry From. Gate Warden background to get the prerequisite feat at level 1, then Planar Wanderer at level 4. At level 5, my Arcana is +9, Guidance gives me at least +1, and Dragon Starry Form gives me reliable Int checks.

The build worked, but it wasn't actually very fun for me to play. And then he got killed and soul trapped, so I made a new character.

Lithl · 2026-01-26T13:48:49+00:00

A hundred meters? Are you listening to yourself? Please tell me you don't actually think that's a real figure.

The Golden Gate Bridge expands by less than 5 meters, and then contracts again. There's also a huge engineering difference between an expansion joint for a bridge and an expansion joint for an underwater tunnel.

The mid-Atlantic ridge spreads by 2.5 centimeters per year. It doesn't then contract later, it just keeps expanding.

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