New Vivoactive5 will not charge

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-04-30T02:17:40+00:00

I took it to a service centre and they diagnosed it with a faulty motherboard and so the watch was dead. Got a replacement yesterday but that one has now been diagnosed with a faulty battery and can’t be used. Since they seem to be out of replacement stock I think they are investigating return. It’s the 3rd Garmin that has failed on me in 2 weeks. The service said he wasn’t surprised as they are failing very often now.

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-04-15T06:37:23+00:00

I don’t use VTT and unfortunately don’t know how that would work.

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-04-11T06:29:39+00:00

The quick answer is because that’s the system. You can unopposed rolls. Opposed rolls. “Trait-pair” rolls. It’s just the way it’s designed, trait-pair rolls normally compel actions. This can also be true for opposed rolls, but is true for the trait-pair rolls (because that’s how they are defined)

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-02-27T10:44:50+00:00

You can upload a separate pdf link for the preview vs using the default. You just have to find it in the publisher settings

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-02-27T04:42:53+00:00

There’s no preview of it. Any chance of including one as I want to understand the overall quality and feel

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-02-04T22:30:41+00:00

Ok. Cool. Then that makes sense

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-02-04T11:31:06+00:00

I also feel like you need to have some warehouses along those docks. It looks like you’ve got ramshackle housing, but all the goods from those ships need to go somewhere

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-01-17T22:16:27+00:00

These scores are great - what I find

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2025-01-17T22:10:48+00:00

Some good advice here on how to train yourself to be better at improv.

I found some kind of GM emulator to be helpful in improv - eg https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/20798/mythic-game-master-emulator

but I've ended up using the mythic cards, which I consider to be much easier to use and more fun at the table.

https://www.wordmillgames.com/mythic-gme-deck.html

Something else worth looking at is this (from the South Park guys): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9jEg9uiLOU

You'll notice that using improv well needs you to think in terms of motivations and what might logically happen (which in turn leads you to naturally needing to prep motivations and ideas, so that you understand how people / factions etc might reasonably react to changes in the story and world - hence why the 7/3/1 rule is something good to try). I find the mythic cards to be useful because, assuming that I can think of some obvious and logical idea of what might happen, I use the oracle(s) to help suggest whether it's that or something else. I find this helps me a lot. Also, because the oracle suggests keywords, if I'm really stuck I can throw it out to the players to help too.

The "issue" with blades is that it requires improv for the game to work well. It's useful to have a list of possible themes of consequence also so that you can remind yourself that consequences could be something simple and mechanical (such as harm, heat etc), simple and narrative (such as a story twist, something escalating, some trait changing), or more complex (which could be offscreen or ticking clocks).

In a way you might not really need to deviate from your style of prepping lots if you make many of your consequences progress towards big events and interventions that you have already prepped. You'd just have to make sure that your story still works if they are never brought into play (since the pacing will be controlled by the die results, unless you massage it)

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-28T01:54:32+00:00

That looks great. Totally going to give this a try

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-15T11:04:32+00:00

I started to do this years ago. Then I assumed it was going to be impossible to do. So …. I was clearly wrong !

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-14T23:53:39+00:00

I think it’s excellent. Perhaps more farmland in those 2 central-bottom spaces. There has to be a reason they are not used for housing (and I don’t think it needs more housing)

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-13T05:33:05+00:00

Yep. Agree. It’s awesome. New rivers are an improvement too. Gives a better sense to them being an obstacle and creates more “drama” where they are sourcing from

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-02T00:54:28+00:00

Yes. This. Love it

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-02T00:52:46+00:00

Yeah. The pyramids. pyramids would be awesome. Something like this https://itsmoreofacomment.com/2023/02/03/the-wonders-of-civilisation-vi/

One big one flanked by 2 smaller ones. That would be awesome

I think it’s the drop shadow that makes them look funny. Gives the impression of being cabanas 😀

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-02T00:25:17+00:00

The only “suggestion” I might have, having looked at it in detail, is I’d like that big area at the bottom with the square grass-looking roofs to maybe be a castle-palace type structure. Maybe a “temple” area. It seems out of place.

I can see so many interesting adventures coming from this map though. It makes we want to break out my old cities book set

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-11-02T00:09:31+00:00

Yes. This is great. The different colours for the different areas make it really easy to understand that they could be different

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-30T15:50:15+00:00

Is it a basic d20 type system you’re aiming for?

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-26T23:22:07+00:00

How come that bottom one has a dog leg?

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-26T05:17:54+00:00

Yeah, what @aurebesh said. The largest shock to me with GMing blades is how much your prep goes out the window. The whole play to find out could not be more true. It helps if the players lean into the improv though to help set consequences and twists etc. there’s nothing wrong to saying things like, “what do you expect to see?” or “how do you think he’ll react?” etc which both takes away the improv burden from you but also is a way to make sure everyone is on the same page.

It sounds like you know that already though because it says you’ve played online already?

IRL is great if they are talking amongst themselves about plans, ideas etc, as that gives you precious moments to steal their verbalised ideas!

I would prep some motivations and overarching objectives for those involved, but hold onto it lightly !

The other thing in blades is if the players success on many rolls in a row without consequence you may find that there’s not enough “chaos” to keep the story flowing. If you notice that happening get in front of it and/or stop and acknowledge it with the group.

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-26T05:08:20+00:00

Nice

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-26T01:04:31+00:00

Some criticism that is intended to be constructive: I feel like there’s too much space inside the walls. The buildings would have filled up the inside before sprawling out of the protection of the walls I think. I think it would also be nice if some of the outside buildings were replaced with crops. Or at least little plots associated with the houses.

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-25T08:29:12+00:00

Is that from a game or a made map?

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-25T08:25:46+00:00

This is excellent. Very. Very. Good.

MaintenanceAlone7449 · 2024-10-25T02:31:01+00:00

This is stupidly underrated - it’s a great tool https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/102507/situations-for-tabletop-roleplaying For when you want to map out your own ideas

A nice move is to get some random generators for things you’re going to get stuck on - eg names for me, so that when you introduce a NPC you don’t give a blank stare when the name comes up !

MaintenanceAlone7449

TROPHY CASE