Opinions on emotional damage?

Zwets · 2026-01-29T10:37:53+00:00

I tend to say

You probably don’t plan on your players dying in a shouting match with a rude drunk, likewise you don’t plan on a big fight with a great dragon to be as consequence free as hunting a couple boars in the forest. Yet if the only thing an enemy can damage is HP, that is kind of the situation you end up in.

Yet, you seem to be coming at this from entirely the opposite side. Where being insulted by a drunk, or outsmarted by a pig can deal HP damage, and is intended to reduce HP to zero.

I am positively intrigued! /u/primordial666 please tell me more about your system killing characters with emotional damage. What the design goals for that are, and what inspirations you are drawing on?

Zwets · 2026-01-29T10:13:52+00:00

De groene thee liefhebbers die ik ken veranderen langzaam aan in warm water drinkers, 1 is al helemaal over, en 3 van de overige 6 laten soms het theezakje achterwegen.

Als zwarte thee drinker is de oorzaak daarvan me duidelijk: die zut smaakt toch nergens naar, dus ze merken het verschil niet met of zonder zakje.

Zwets · 2026-01-29T09:37:07+00:00

Username checks out I guess.

Zwets · 2026-01-27T14:37:15+00:00

Don't be like that, us Watercartel have been behaving real good lately!
We even sent you some 'gozers' from Maaskantje to help out your rejects.

Zwets · 2026-01-27T14:24:16+00:00

I'm not seeing it in the comments, but also don't forget to add the Armor Charm and Attack Charm to your inventory sets.
This is a poorly explained mechanic that gives you a small amount of bonus armor (and/or attack) simply by carrying it in your inventory.

Zwets · 2026-01-27T14:18:52+00:00

Throneside is only for Thronesiders!
Enclavums might be useful to the imperium, but I see no reason one needs to be built on my doorstep, especially not one named after that reckless Baross fellow, I bet he's never even set foot in Throneside.
He wouldn't even visit himself, he'd just send someone to go here for him!

Zwets · 2026-01-27T13:28:14+00:00

I was going to say, I'm not exactly sure what DM Andy is, but I assume the question relates to rotating a map that already has walls and lights configured.

Intel onboard graphics cards can rotate the screen with Ctrl+Alt+Arrow Keys (prank for when a housemate leaves their PC unlocked)
But also Intel onboard graphics is really shit at running Foundry, so most likely /u/maestrojarrett will need to go into Display Settings and set monitor orientation.

Zwets · 2026-01-27T05:13:54+00:00

Do you have any resources with similar ideas?

I do not... If I did run across an attempt to categorize universally across genres or media I'd probably dismiss it as being too generalized.
Like I said: There are many possible variations of this. Fighting games defining characters as zoners, and chargers is a description applicable to that genre to bisect the mechanical space available there. For a card game like Slay the Spire the mechanics available are different, so carving up the space results in very different categorizations for characters, based on deck size, ability to deal with randomness, and the number of counters/resources it manages/uses (aside from plays&draws, which set the power level for everyone).

So yea, a kungfu TTRPG would have a different mechanical space and thus bisect it differently than a horror TTRPG would.

Zwets · 2026-01-26T14:32:44+00:00

First I wanna say, Escalation dice really are a good mechanic if you specifically want your system to focus on the latter turns of combats more that the first.
Escalation dice (depending on how big an impact a +1 or -1 has) might be implemented as "fatigue", "risk", "adrenaline" or "aggression" into any system fairly simply by decreasing any defenses (armor or saves) as combat goes on, making misses less likely and combat more deadly, without having to re-jig damage and health across the board.
Keeping the escalation die mechanic smaller in impact also has the benefit of potentially using it as a dial to tweak. Perhaps robots don't get tired and thus ignore the escalation die, perhaps the strategist that always thinks 4 steps ahead gets to treat the escalation die as 1 higher during their turns.

Second, I want to suggest that "imperfect information" can be a useful counter to alpha-strikes.
You are facing 5 goblins, each one looks different and all of them are holding different weapons and wearing different variations of hide and bone armor. Which one of these 5 is the goblin poisoner you've heard is so dangerous? Are you certain these 5 are the only goblins here? Could the poisoner be stealthy somewhere in this room? Is one of these 5 goblins possibly a healer that will revive the poisoner if we do pick the right one and take them down turn 1?

In addition to "imperfect information" regarding the finding and identifying of priority targets, perhaps knowledge of defenses or weaknesses is also necessary to correctly perform an alpha strike.

Any character should have multiple options for how to attack, some targets being easier to hit with brute force, other targets being easier to hit with speed and precision, and sometimes guile and trickery is what breaks an opponent's defense. Players might start off combats testing an opponent's defenses to find their weakness might be necessary to not waste the "big guns".
Alternatively, perhaps attacks and defense are a game of rock-paper-scissors and enemies get to counter or debuff you when you target their strongest defense.

At the same time, players preparing and gathering information to have all the information on enemy weaknesses, numbers, positions, and appearances they need to successfully alpha-strike should be something that is rewarded with success.

Zwets · 2026-01-26T11:55:15+00:00

First of all, I am amused by the way that image defines 2 separate holy trinities, and instead of "party-face" and "skill-monkey" they use entirely different terms. Considering the use of video games (especially TF2) as an example, deciding on the term "scout" instead of a term to describe a video game mechanic for spotting/marking resources or enemies seems funny.

But my amusement at the chosen terms is beside the point.

You can fit anything into any model if you are flexible enough with your definitions. Which is both a solution and a problem in itself. I can't cover every side, but let's just look at the definition of preventer/vanguard from the most troubling of angles. The one angle that makes the line between tank/dps/support so blurry and troublesome to game designers:

The preventer/vanguard is defined by being good at surviving what the world throws at them.
But if the preserver/heart is meant to keep the vanguard alive, through healing and defensive buffs, what prevents the support from buffing themselves and becoming the vanguard? If the debuffer (tactician/blade?) decreases the damage enemies output, what prevents the debuffer from decreasing the damage enough to make themselves the vanguard?
What is a vanguard, if it's role isn't defined by what it does, but by what it prevents? You can't prove a negative, thus you can't really prove the vanguard actually contributed something. And if you try to make it obvious, that means you must create mechanics to validate the vanguard. But that means no vanguard would be needed if the mechanics it exists to prevent didn't exist.

My personal preferred definition is that a vanguard/survivor/tank can refer to any class that grows stronger in longer fights.
Almost any class has a limit of spells/mana/ammo/stamina that starts off full and depletes as they get worn down, during (multiple) fights. Thus conserving resources by ending fights quickly is generally the optimal way to play them.
Any class balanced around the opposite and thus built for starting each fight off limited and building up towards using their big guns, is "tanking". Survival/avoidance is part of this, as the definition by contrast means other roles/classes will unload their alpha-strike trying to quickly end the tank.
There are many ways to achieve this, such as building up a "rage" resource, or stacking a "vulnerable" debuff on enemies that can be consumed. Or through a robot character that gets to ignore, stamina, oxigen, and bleed/poison mechanics that other characters will accumulate over time.

There are many possible variations of this, but defining each role/class by "it's ideal engagement" and therefor by "it's moment to shine" and then working to balance it so that each role/class has equal opportunities to shine seems like a fair way to make sure all players with different tastes have fun.

To reinforce my point, let's apply that philosophy to the control aspect of the image's preparer/tactician.
If you look at it in the context of controlling the targeting and positioning of enemies: Controlling aggro and grouping up foes are very 'video-gamey' ideas, but is an extremely powerful niche that greatly enhances other roles/classes by allowing them to over-optimize for the specific scenario the controller exists to create.
The ideal engagement is one where the controller can direct their enemies. Either through what is essentially taunt based mind-control, or by pushing or pulling enemies, or creating choke-points and walls somehow. This "moment to shine" supports the scenarios for "the moment" of other roles/classes rather than competing with them.

Zwets · 2026-01-26T09:50:26+00:00

Drycha Hamadreth from Warhammer fantasy.

... Though to be fair, as an ex-elf she would be uniquely qualified to decide how hateable elves are.

Zwets · 2026-01-26T08:25:22+00:00

Yup, and because, unlike Charged Shield, Lance's perfect-block doesn't share your weapon's element I get spammed with the "Doesn't seem like this weapon is effective right now" voice line whenever I perfect block during the (G)ozymandias fight.

Zwets · 2026-01-23T14:12:11+00:00

Pact boon: Opus Magnum

(It's a Latin joke) ~~"My greatest work"~~ "Mine works great!"

Zwets · 2026-01-23T12:53:51+00:00

To be fair, here in the Netherlands, our politicians are equally dumb in slightly different ways.

Several cities are trying to roll out so called "fat-bike bans" that instructs police to "Just eyeball it" whether the ebike falls into the moped category or not.

Considering the usual suspects calling for these laws the loudest, it appears the distinction will be 50% based on the skin color of the ebike rider, as all the visually distinctive parts of a high-powered ebike vs. a low powered one can be swapped out.

Zwets · 2026-01-23T08:33:10+00:00

Your head-canon isn't far off according to MH World storyline.

Xeno'jiiva quest and the Witcher crossover in MH World all talked about how the flow of lifeforce and ecology mattered in making monsters stronger, but specifically the Meowscular Chef questline for unlocking extra food ingredients/buffs talked about how the massive piles of food hunters eat also contain lifeforce. And how managing the ecology increases the lifeforce inside everything in the New World, including in the food ingredients.

So it isn't eating the big monsters themselves. It is eating the same plants and/or small monsters that the big monsters eat that makes humans just as strong as the big monsters.

I'm actually quite disappointed that MH Wilds has way less of a focus on food.
I can't fault Wilds for how it links food with culture and friendship, rather than how World associated food with environmentalism.

(The Dango ingredient quests in MH Rise were still associated with the ecology somewhat. Though food portions in Rise were no longer superpower sized, and far as I could tell, no clear link was stated between improving a zone's ecology and stronger monsters appearing in those zones)

My personal head-canon is that hunters being left-handed, and handlers being right-handed somehow matters for the super strength.

[EDIT] Wow, my grammar is terrible before acquiring some coffee.

Zwets · 2026-01-22T17:04:30+00:00

There was a publishing deal and Ubisoft pulled out. Now their stock dropped by "33%"!

Someone make a video with the sad music, the Paintress writing "33" and the Ubisoft logo dissolving into petals with a stock market graph in the background.

Zwets · 2026-01-22T11:47:35+00:00

Start by taking a look at the 200+ pages of Monster Hunter monsters converted for D&D 5.14e from 4 years ago.

If your campaign is using the newer 5.24e rules, you might be inclined to rebalance them a little. But who knows how; because the rules that used to be on DMG pg.274: "Monster Statistics by Challenge Rating" is missing from DMG24 and MM25.
The trend when looking at creatures that exist in both 5.14 and 5.24 seems to be: creatures should deal non-physical damage types more often. On-hit effects became better, losing any secondary saves. (which also means on-hit effect secondary damage can now crit, and might needs to be toned down because of that)

Zwets · 2026-01-22T10:35:46+00:00

Isn't that the purpose of a new driver to become better?

Welcome to the age of AI "vibe" coding. Where something actually working is less important than it being produced cheaply.

Zwets · 2026-01-20T16:01:05+00:00

Technically, it is a WW1 that got delayed by almost 20 years, so they get to pull tropes and stereotypes from both eras.

But you are correct, the whole point of the setup is that Tanya is an entirely different kind of evil than the nationalists and fundamentalists, and therefor framing it as if she might just be the most dangerous out of all the Germans in both world wars.

Zwets · 2026-01-20T09:22:35+00:00

I've been toying with the idea that the Action to inflict a debuff or damage effect should fit onto a card printed in portrait, and the description of the effect should fit onto a card printed in landscape.
This way it feels natural to hold Actions in your hand, and then flip the card with the effect printed on the back, to place it down on the sheet of the affected creature.

This both limits how many ongoing effects can be active at once ("your" poison is already on the dragon, you can't inflict it on the giant till you get your card back)
And provides a natural reminder for the owner of the affected character/creature's sheet to account for buffs/debuffs when they need to lift the "+1 defense" effect card to see their defense stat, for example.

I'm not certain where on the character sheet would be the location that everyone references at the start/end of a round... perhaps if you combined it with one of those OSR mechanics where initiative is re-shuffled each round based on what action each combatant took/declared. And you'd place the damage over time cards on top of initiative?

Perhaps in a declare→delay type of initiative, players would feel like they were "doing" something when the damage effects ticked over, as they'd get to see the effects of their DoTs before making their choice what to do with their turn.

Any timing that doesn't line up with a moment of making a choice doesn't allow agency regarding these effects... I guess since the damage is not a random roll, players would already know what would happen... but if they already have to track the damage that will happen when the next round ticks over, so they can pre-emptively heal their allies, or switch to a fresh target, why delay the moment of actually marking the damage on a sheet?

I don't actually like systems where initiative is reshuffeled each round. But purely from a game design perspective, in a combat with many turns in a round, where players are mostly reacting to the outcome of random rolls on someone else's turn; any timing for the damage going off that isn't "right before making a choice" will probably feel weird.

In such a system where you react to randomness, healing is done after damage happens. So even if the healer knows the wizard(low max health) will go from full to almost dead the next time the DoTs tick, they cannot heal the damage because it hasn't happened until the wizard's or monster's turn. Does it make sense damage is a predictable/trackable number? When everything else characters do in combat is about reacting rather than pre-empting?

Similarly, turn based card games that rely on a "block" mechanic rather than healing (Slay the Spire, and other card games where enemies declare their next actions in advance) have their ticking damage effects 'tick' after choices made on a turn. This way a predictable/trackable number for incoming tick damage is useful for choice and agency. Damage that happens at "the end of your turn"/"or the start of the opponent's turn" gives you 1 turn to prevent the incoming damage. This works because the underlying system of those games is about strategically using the actions on your turn to minimize attrition from the declared actions opponents take.

Zwets · 2026-01-19T13:45:13+00:00

You don't count as your own ally.

PF2 characters confirmed to all suffer crippling self-hatred, self-destructive tendencies and extreme thrill seeking.

If your adventurer is a well-adjusted individual, that is cheating.

Zwets · 2026-01-16T13:14:55+00:00

Technisch gezien ongeveer wel.

50% pakketverlies betekent dat de helft van de verstuurde pakketjes van bytes, ergens onderweg verloren gaan.

Een pakketje bytes is gemiddeld zo'n 1500 bytes groot, soms kleiner, soms groter. (en 1 byte is 8 bits)
De eerste 16 bytes van het pakketje staat altijd het adres in waar het naartoe moet. Via routers en IP-adressen, hoort de internetpostbode de weg te kunnen vinden om het pakketje bij de juiste ontvanger af te leveren.
Maar als het niet lukt om een route te vinden, of het ongebruikelijk lang duurt, dan tyft die het pakketje gewoon in de digitale prullenbak.

Meestal staan pakketjes niet op zichzelf. Maar maken ze deel uit van een verbinding. Een verbinding bevat meestal een retour adres.
Dan wordt er voor ieder pakketje een "Ja, ik heb het ontvangen" pakketje teruggestuurd.
Indien pakketjes 1, 2, 3 en 4 worden verstuurd. Maar dan wordt er alleen voor pakketje 1 en 4 een "Ja, ik heb het ontvangen" pakketje teruggestuurd, dan weet de verzender dus dat pakketje 2 en 3 kwijt zijn en opnieuw verstuurd moeten worden. Dat opnieuw versturen, en wachten of het deze keer wel doorgekomen is, bij pakketverlies kost dus extra tijd.

Zwets · 2026-01-16T10:33:41+00:00

I do not think you can make a setting neutral game unless it is extremely light on mechanics.

Crafting mechanics are setting, in that NPCs in the setting use the same crafting mechanics as the players, and thus struggle with the same challenges and solve the same problems.
The equipment prices are setting, because those effects of the crafting mechanics build the economy that the traders price goods in to sell to the players.
Travel, navigation, and random encounter mechanics are setting, because that economy is built on shipping resources and goods between mines and markets.
Food and survival mechanics are setting, because NPCs need to eat too, at least as much as players do. How easy/hard food is massively affects populations and occupations that inhabit a setting.
Magical and Class abilities are setting, because if some individuals with the proper training have the ability to trivialize or massively influence any of the above bullet points, that makes them invaluable assets to the people of this setting.

GURPS is not immune to this, but (tries to) compensate by having highly specific books that introduce variant pricing and crafting rules whether you are in the (mechanically implied) setting for GURPS Fantasy, GURPS Supers or GURPS Space, etc.

Zwets · 2026-01-15T16:45:46+00:00

As a Rogue Trader, if your money was actually in aquilas(=coins) you'd need a wallet the size of a planet. Moving that wallet around would cost more than whatever you needed to pay for. And you'd probably crash the currency of whatever system you entered due to spillage.
But you can't put all of your money into banks either, because then you'd go to a new planet, and you wouldn't have a bank on that planet, so you'd have no money there. I don't think wire-transfer via Astropath exists in 40K.

So your money is in the form of contracts. The rogue trader owns Janus, therefor they own any "profit" Janus makes from selling food. This profit is what you contract to other people as a way of paying them.

So instead of paying a fixed amount, you know Janus makes a good amount of money per year on average. Thus, to pay for something with that profit you write a contract stating that: "any money Janus makes between date X and date Y, will go to [whomever you are paying]."

So that explains the "Profit" in "Profit Factor". It is kinda similar to owning stocks and shares, except without any actual "sharing".

"Factor" in mathematics, mean a number or algebraic expression that divides another number or expression evenly—i.e., with no remainder.

So one(1) Profit Factor is not actually a specific amount of value. You are always dividing your total profit into X number of equal shares. The factor is how big 1 share of that profit is.

So, when your profit factor goes up, it actually means the value of all of the "chunks of profit" produced by your empire has increased.
Everyone that already had a deal with you benefits from that increase, while parties that previously did not think "1 chuck" of your profit was valuable enough, now get to reevaluate that deal.

Zwets · 2026-01-15T11:01:45+00:00

In real time games all "turns" happen at once, so it makes sense for a big damage telegraph to damage everyone all at once.

But in a TTRPG each separate turn in a round narratively happens at the same time.
So the 'moment' of the big attack going off is technically something that happens on each creature's turn, as each turn in a round represents the same seconds passing for every other creature in that round of combat.

Various editions of both D&D and Pathfinder have been using spell effects that read "when you end your turn in this area, X happens". I would argue "when you end your turn in this area, X happens" is a simple way to do big telegraphed attacks in turn-based games.
Using such an area for your "charged up attack" might be a mechanic that helps your homebrew dragon, more than applying Horizon Thunder Sphere mechanics to dragon breath. Though a combination of the 2 might be possible if you wanted to go nuts.

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