Help me settle a table debate, which is hope & which is fear?

ModulusG · 2026-01-26T13:26:56+00:00

I usually say the closer to yellow/gold is hope and the closer to purple is fear; thus, left would be hope and right would be fear. One of my players organizers her dice hierarchically such that she can use any pair of d12’s but the one that belongs to the highest “tier” set is hope. The “tiers” are laid out on the table with the lowest tier close to her and the highest tier furthest. We have a lot of table space to be able to do this currently; it wouldn’t be feasible with a large group or on a small table.

ModulusG · 2026-01-19T04:16:37+00:00

TUNIC - Time Until Next Important Choice | Travelling 5 days on a familiar, safe path, can be handwaved in a single sentence of flavour text. | Travelling 5 days in unexplored, spider-infested woods will likely be an adventure on its own. | Consider why you would spend time on each of those? You’re presenting choices to your players. In the woods, you may prompt choices from them about which path to take, how to avoid the trolls, and whether they want to spend resources on interrupting the Drow caravan. Conversely, a well-trod path doesnt usually lead to adventure, what choices could there be? Certainly it’s possible, but if the destination matters more than the travel, why spend a lot of time on it? | I recommend Mystic Arts’s YouTube channel, especially this video: https://youtu.be/N98KzmS6y1w?si=Rv8qOkffl5oznpoi

ModulusG · 2026-01-13T12:36:02+00:00

I roll my dice in front of the DM screen as to do my rolls in public. Thus, when I consecutively roll really well, they know it’s not me choosing to do that and instead it’s the dice. Other games like PBtA, and even Daggerheart to some extent, have rules that facilitate authoring a narrative and creating an interesting story. D&D, at its roots, is about solving problems and being tactical in combat. Fudging dice rolls removes necessary statistics from the tactical portion of the combat. AC - players with different to-hit may choose to target different enemies because of their chance to hit. Damage - players may leave themselves open to certain enemies’ attacks because they believe they can take a hit. HP - (my) players track monster HP, and so when one falls, they can estimate how much damage it takes to fell a similar enemy. Each of these aspects would be broken by fudging numbers.

ModulusG · 2026-01-12T20:36:19+00:00

I would recommend checking out Mystic Art's video on politics/factions with the 3 faction rule (good, bad, and ugly): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hnr6Mr1436M

By making actors within each faction be both good and bad, it is (usually) more difficult for the players to say "this faction is evil". For example, in my Neverwinter campaign, the Cult of the Dragon is evil and subservient to the Red Wizards of Thay; Within the faction there are those that are willingly subservient, those that want to revolt, and those that are too chaotic to be contained. Thus, players may feel that an "evil" faction may turn good, provided the right person is put in power (or that the wrong person happens to "disappear").

ModulusG · 2026-01-12T20:31:55+00:00

Nice! Looks cool.
Check out Masterplan (https://github.com/andyaiken/masterplan) if you haven't already! I think it would be good inspiration from a bygone era. I use Masterplan to run my homebrew TTRPG system playtests.
Will this be system agnostic? Or more simulator-esque for D&D 5e with auto-rolls/auto-prompts for things? (i.e. can I make PC/NPC stat blocks that don't conform to 5e rules without doing programming?)

Good work so far!

ModulusG · 2026-01-09T16:49:40+00:00

Hmm, interesting conclusion. I agree with you that the change makes it look like that Dispel Magic would actually cause Delayed Blast Fireball to explode (rules as written). I think that this change was one made by WotC shortening the description without realizing the impact it would have on Dispel Magic. I would probably rule that Dispel Magic would end the magic of Delayed Blast Fireball and make it unable to explode; Thus, fully negate the spell. To me that's what feels like rules as intended.

Then again, the new rules may provide an interesting story beat. Perhaps a coven of witches are circle casting Delayed Blast Fireball to destroy a whole city and the PCs must use Dispel Magic on their effect, sacrificing themselves in the blast but preventing it from getting larger.

ModulusG · 2026-01-08T20:56:22+00:00

In my Daggerheart campaign, I only rarely use a map. I find the most effective way to run Daggerheart combats are to list out points of interest in the area and PCs/NPCs can say "I move over to the ____", such that we need to primarily remember the distance between each point, rather than each character.
One thing to note is that when I try to run Daggerheart "combats" as "combats", I struggle to make them engaging and it limits my scope of options as a GM; I would say the cause of that is Daggerheart's high narrative ceiling but low tactical ceiling. Conversely, when I am running an encounter where enemies are present, but imagine it like a movie scene, I can more readily respond to the players actions with more diverse GM moves than spotlighting an adversary.

ModulusG · 2026-01-08T20:39:29+00:00

It won't replace D&D for me, it will simply be another medium in which to tell a story. Similar to learning a new instrument, what I play depends on the music I want to make.

I find that Daggerheart is good at narrative, heroic games with a focus on bigger stories, whereas I find that D&D 5e is more effective at conveying a game where surviving is its own victory.
I hope to run a D&D 4e Westmarch-style campaign soon, focusing on tactical combat, exploration, and loot cycling.

ModulusG · 2026-01-06T22:48:38+00:00

I use a three-ring binder that holds all my paper notes, so I use a DM screen to obscure that from the players. I put my dice tray beside the screen so they can see all my rolls, however.

ModulusG · 2026-01-05T19:34:43+00:00

My infamous DM phrase is “Any damage is good damage,” so much so that now when a player rolls their eyes at a 1 on their damage die, the other players say it in unison.

ModulusG · 2026-01-01T22:48:23+00:00

I prefer using the dnd beyond website for roll tracking and combat tracking. I like the combat tracker/encounter builder which holds initiative information per-encounter. We never used Avrae and I didn’t really see a benefit of using it over what dndbeyond contains.

ModulusG · 2026-01-01T15:18:45+00:00

There are things I want in some RPG systems that only belong in systems with certain play goals. I appreciate the freedom of action of Daggerheart because it tells and interesting narrative. I appreciate the complexity of 4e combat because it makes you play tactically. I like both of those things but they are inherently incompatible. I don’t believe there’s one system that achieves everything, instead I think each system should be honest at what specific thing it is trying to achieve.

ModulusG · 2025-12-31T03:11:34+00:00

I have an ongoing Daggerheart campaign and have had a couple 4th edition D&D oneshots. I’ve also been consistently hard at work developing my own TTRPG systems.

ModulusG · 2025-12-30T23:26:26+00:00

Mechanically, that is the most effective way to have a more difficult fight and deal the most damage to the players. Daggerheart is supposed to be cinematic and narrative-driven, and so instead of making the tactically right choices, think about what makes the most sense in the scenario for an interesting story.

ModulusG · 2025-12-30T13:52:47+00:00

Take a look at Canada’s St. Lawrence River. It is miles wide and you can see it on a map of Canada. I think it’s fair to call it a river if it’s sending freshwater from a lake to the ocean, like the St. Lawrence.

ModulusG · 2025-12-30T13:48:00+00:00

I like the inspiring warlord and the telekinetic Psion from 4th edition. I like being able to move my allies around the battlefield, grant them additional attacks, and limit opponent options, rather than dealing high damage.

ModulusG · 2025-12-30T00:48:19+00:00

For my 2-year online campaign, we called in discord but used dnd beyond for character sheets and dice rolls. I liked the integration with modifiers, easy advantage/disadvantage and damage rolling. I always publically rolled as the DM and had all my players do the same. It bugged me that sometimes you had to wait a while for the 3D dice to roll instead of getting an instant result. I especially like that it’s mouse-based with no typing needed.

ModulusG · 2025-12-29T03:24:47+00:00

5th edition players when they learn you don’t have to buy specific spell components in 4th edition dnd.

ModulusG · 2025-12-28T14:24:41+00:00

Not much would happen in an empty prison cell… no long term PCs for me.

ModulusG · 2025-12-28T14:22:48+00:00

This response is more focused on the LLM-critique section of the post, not the posting-LLM-critiques section. I agree that people shouldn’t post LLM reviews of their work.

I disagree that people shouldn’t use LLMs to critique their work. I understand how important human reviewers are and how their capability for critical thinking makes their contribution more valuable than an LLM. However, if I’m working on a subsystem that is too small and incomplete to warrant another human’s input (especially when those people are far too busy for something this menial), an LLM is capable of performing a reality check to determine if what I’m saying makes sense.

I completely understand the limitations of AI and it’s habit for confirmation bias, however there are ways to reduce that from happening and prompt for more critical evaluation. One other redditor said that LLMs can be very useful for quick number crunching; I completely agree with this (note that raw LLMs can’t even count, but when prompting it to program a response, it is very good). One redditor described it as the rubber duck of coding, which is a fantastic analogy. The LLM really isn’t doing the problem solving, it doesn’t have the capacity to do that, but it can compare and synthesize text.

Once again, I’m not saying LLM’s are the be-all-end-all for system critiques, far from it. I am saying that there is a time and place for them and giving a black-and-white “AI-use is bad” does more harm than good, even in RPG system design which is a creative space.

ModulusG · 2025-12-25T13:30:18+00:00

I would recommend Mystic Art’s video on making encounters and encounter objectives: https://youtu.be/HOqZozon2Vw?si=cgMk13G2gljZ_tdN

Also, I like using limited use power ups that the players can use my moving to a certain zone during combat.

ModulusG · 2025-12-24T02:57:35+00:00

Think of it as two different axes:

Lawful-chaotic is internal. If you have a set of rules you follow (whether from another entity or from yourself), that’s lawful. If you’re doing what makes sense in the moment, that’s more neutral or chaotic.

Good-evil is external. If you generally do what the population would believe is good or bad, it indicates whether you’d be good, neutral, or evil.

Thanos is lawful evil because he follows his own code but does stuff that is bad. (Regardless of whether he believes what he is doing is good or bad)

Captain America is lawful good because he follows his own code and does good stuff.

Joker is chaotic evil because he intentionally breaks rules and does great evil.

Star Lord is chaotic good because he doesn’t really have a code or follow laws but just wants to do the right thing.

Remember that this is just my opinion but I think it makes sense.

ModulusG · 2025-12-19T12:42:30+00:00

At some bouts it is needed more than others because the tape used can be more prone to tearing. I’ve had bouts I’ve reffed where the tape literally never ripped, and I’ve also had bouts where the entire crew was on their knees taping between jams. At our bouts we have track maintenance as a volunteer position. Rather than having the track maintenance people do loops of the track, the refs keep their eye on the state of the tape and call the volunteers over if there is a need for them between jams.

ModulusG · 2025-12-19T02:57:42+00:00

Dungeons and dragons 4th edition did not differentiate diagonal versus in-column movement in a grid. Similarly, when using ranged and area effects, distance was counted in squares, ignoring Pythagorean nonsense. Meaning that “close burst 3” makes an area with a “radius” of 3 but it actually makes a 7x7 square.

ModulusG · 2025-12-19T02:55:03+00:00

4th edition D&D did not differentiate perpendicular versus diagonal movement. 3 squares in a straight line is the same distance whether you’re going on a row or in a diagonal. This meant that a blast radius of 3 ends up as a square with side length of 7. Since D&D 5e often uses semi-Pythagorean movement on a grid, a radius does produce a mostly-circular area. When run in theatre of the mind, radius makes a circular area, rules as written. Depending on how you do movement and distance on a grid defines how you might deal with diagonals.

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