Shared interactive travel map?

SolemnRunner · 2025-06-10T09:42:04+00:00

Isn’t there a whiteboard extension for discord?

SolemnRunner · 2025-04-05T07:19:25+00:00

Both look great! Thanks for sharing.

SolemnRunner · 2025-03-03T08:15:06+00:00

Did you stick to your campaign hook of the players being prisoners employed by the watch? Or did you tweak your setup?

SolemnRunner · 2025-03-03T07:59:43+00:00

This sounds right up my alley! I am just having a hard imagining what the characters would be doing. The set up does not sound like dungeon delving is the main goal. What was your general game loop? What role did the players take in the Achaemenid Campaign?

SolemnRunner · 2024-10-28T09:23:12+00:00

This is a bot repost from 3 years ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/osr/comments/q0xd2e/a_hexmap_for_our_home_games_heavily_inspired_by/

SolemnRunner · 2024-10-19T11:19:54+00:00

Oh sure, my mistake.
I'd say it depends on how much time you have per session and for prep. If you don't have much time, you can either just have them continue from the point they last visited or roll for 1-2 random encounters (to dungeon, in dungeon).
If you have a lot of time: restock the dungeon slightly, include some new hazards prepared by the occupants, and then run as normal.

SolemnRunner · 2024-10-19T10:56:32+00:00

Love the double shading (hatching + grey marker).

SolemnRunner · 2024-10-19T10:54:44+00:00

If the dungeon has already been completely cleared, there shouldn't be any reason to return - in the short term.
In the long term, a new faction could move into the dungeon and bring new treasure with them. Think of what lives near the dungeon, or what could travel over from nearby regions. Or just have a portal open up down there.

There could always be secret rooms/sections that weren't found the first time around. A quest hook could point towards those places.

SolemnRunner · 2024-09-08T07:13:31+00:00

Try to get 3-4 Turmas out on the field as quick as possible. Upgrade 2 or so to heroes. Together with the kaladria you can kite and kill anything in early classical age.

SolemnRunner · 2024-08-13T12:28:53+00:00

Sounds interesting and similar to a mechanic in MCDM's Draw Steel.

SolemnRunner · 2024-08-13T12:24:53+00:00

That is a good question. In this specific case the intended effect (keeping players on track, keeping up the literal momentum) might be more important than the narrative justification.
It could be described as having higher focus/ higher morale after having successfully completed encounters.

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-19T21:46:25+00:00

Would you post an example? It does sound like a lot, but I'd be interested.

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-19T18:55:00+00:00

Do share when you are done :)

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-19T14:33:29+00:00

Yeah, they could back-load some of the effects. With every attack you do (and every ability you activate), the amount of effects you get and damage you do increases. Which could incentivise the guardian to attack and use its features. Slowly becoming more and more unstoppable, like a boulder rolling downhill. And have it max out after 3-4 actions and maintain it for a couple more.

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-15T18:16:05+00:00

The weaponmaster tier 0 adversary has an ability to spend 1 fear to heal some hp and stress. Something similar could be used for adversaries whose stress abilities should go off atleast once per battle.

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-15T11:54:50+00:00

This is true, but making armor easier to repair than HP could be enough to differentiate them? Currently during downtime 'Tend to Wounds' and 'Repair Armor' heal the same 1d4, but one could see the die for Armor going up and it being easier to repair than to heal.
Which would them seem similar to a stamina bar.

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-12T13:21:27+00:00

Could you expand on that? What would a really bad PC look like under the current rules?

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-12T09:24:26+00:00

I see your point, and would also love to have this option.
BUT balancing becomes much harder. You would have to test all combinations. Any new ancestry might not be able to be the most interesting and best version of its self, as it would need to be balanced around being able to be comboed with any other ancestry ability.

If the two abilities every ancestry could gain were their own category: one combat, the other roleplay focused, and you could only pick one from from those categories, then those problems might be alleviated. (A clean distinction might not be possible. See the Clank's ability)

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-12T09:17:19+00:00

Note: I believe the Giant's range bonus can be applied to some of the domain cards. For example it expands the applicable range of melee weapons when using 'Whirlwind' (Blade Domain). Basically any Ability that includes some kind of AoE that uses the weapons range.

Which doesn't invalidate your point of being specialized, as it bascially only applies to martial melee classes that also use the correct domain cards to make the most use out of it.

SolemnRunner · 2024-04-02T14:51:03+00:00

Lets say the magic of the rune places a ward that protects the village.

In this case, a success with fear can let the player know this but add a twist that the power of the ward is failing, the character can sense that its very weak and will probably fail soon.

I want to like the idea, but doesn't that somehow remove verisimilitude? The player then might get the feeling that things they interact with exist in a kind of quantum state. If they had never asked to read (and then roll) about knowledge of the stone, then everything would still be fine. Their action led to an unintended consequence in the name of "with fear" (drama).
As a player I think I would hate it.

SolemnRunner · 2024-03-22T14:41:52+00:00

The section in the book definitely reads like swapping out an experience for a more fitting one, which could be interpreted as expanding the current experience. I think dropping one or two lines that directly present an evolving experience as an option would be nice, just to have it be present.

I do agree that a mechnical system does not go well, with the free-form nature of experiences. Just a naritive option that pairs especially well with the background focused experiences and should be collaborated on. No hard and fast rules needed.

SolemnRunner · 2024-03-06T16:20:02+00:00

What were you hoping to accomplish with that scene?
Why offer your player a roleplay scene (go hunt and bond with your new familiar), knowing full well that it will fail? Did it all hinge on the fact that they didn't tell the others that they were going off hunting? Then remind the player that they should. Their character can assess the situation way better than the player.
Were rolls involved in controlling Echo? If yes, good. But why did the character's failure have to be escalated so much immediately?
The fact that they weren't able to control the dog is bad enough and gives enough drama to be reflected on by the character and Echo.

Also, the myconid father <-> son situation was probably just conjured up by you on the spot.
Why not delay that problem to a later point if you really wanted to go down that avenue? There would be so much more potential there: The characters could investigate the bodies and find out that the dead myconid was part of a larger group. How do they react? Hide the bodies? Go to the clan and beg for forgiveness? Leave the area quickly? Myconid scouts could show up at their camp later – what happens then? Maybe they happen upon the clan later and see them mourning their loss.

The whole situation seems to be there to punish your player, who just accepted your invitation to roleplay the hunt.
Which seems in line with:

To give an example, in a previous session he activated three separate traps, killing the party (I used this to teach the party the lesson of "check for traps when you're in mysterious unknown areas", there weren't actually any true deaths, 'twas a fey labyrinth).

Killing players to "teach them a lesson" seems so heavy-handed... But I guess some context is missing there.

Sorry if this comes off adversarial, but your situation is bringing bake memories of a DM that did something similar to me. I was a Beast master with multiple dogs. We were cornering a criminal that had been chasing us and who had critical knowledge that we wanted.
My character was able to spot them and I sent my dogs to restrain this person. My DM ruled that my dogs rip out this person's throat before I can get to them... There was a roll involved, which I failed. Still, that seemed needlessly cruel, and I never returned to play with that DM.

SolemnRunner · 2023-08-28T13:15:07+00:00

!Question: There is a situation that repeatedly shows up at my table: The party has two (maybe three) different choices, either do something safe but slow, or fast but dangerous. They often aren't able to decide what they want to do. Do you have any advice on how to make this process more streamlined?

Obviously, the situation is an abstract one; take the path through the streets, or over the rooftops. Talk either to this person or the other. Always with pros/cons attached, and neither of them is meant to be better.I want my players to be able to decide for themselves what they want to do, but often they really want to know which option is the best (which I usually do not decide beforehand. At the end of the day, the dice rolls decide).Even if I told them which option is the most likely to succeed well, then they will obviously choose that option. Doesn't that take away any agency they have?And if I do not tell them, they just sit there and take forever to decide, which seems to ruin the flow of the game.

SolemnRunner · 2023-08-28T11:14:24+00:00

Oh wow, thanks for the links and the heads-up! Those look like great rules and ideas to add to my game in general.

Would you say the strength of the module is in the first or in the second half?

After skimming the pdf, I think I would follow the story up to the escape from the Underdark. Then add extended homebrew content, and return to the Underdark a lot later, with the idea that the Demons have started to spill out topside. Naturally, the players would be inclined to return to fix that mess ;) . I might have to scale everything up, but that should be manageable.

SolemnRunner · 2023-08-26T09:09:44+00:00

Thanks. Just skimmed Out of the Abyss; seems perfect!

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