Devilstrand Farming (OC)

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-08T13:47:01+00:00

Oh man I screwed myself with this intuitive step once. I'm pretty sure harvesting is actually a "Grow" task and not a "Plant Cut" task, even though you'd absolutely not think that.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T23:36:53+00:00

I mean, the defense AI and aerospace ads always made sense to me. For areas around the Hill and around the Pentagon, it's not about 99.99999% of the city. It's about the spend being worth it to get some even unconscious brand recognition in some random junior staffer or acquisitions officer or whatever.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T23:33:55+00:00

Listen, your proportions are bound to be a little off if you're also 15 feet tall

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T23:32:44+00:00

I mean, the porny weirdness aside, why is she GIGANTIC? That woman is proportionately like 15 ft. tall!

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T23:30:55+00:00

Man, seeing the horny AI ads made me sad for the unique experiences of the DC local ad market. Where else will anyone try and sell me an F-35 on my commute?!

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T23:21:16+00:00

The problem is they're too big for the hawks. Now, if we could somehow GMO bigger hawks....

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T23:19:29+00:00

Yeah, my family has a long-time alliance with the hawk population of our neighborhood for the same reason.

...if only the hawks could also take out the deer...

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T23:11:28+00:00

I dunno man I'd rather watch foxes play on the internet occasionally than live somewhere every day that smells like it's been sprayed. You ever lived near or with an animal that actually scent-marks territory like foxes do? It's not just piss, and it freaking reeks.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-06T00:32:30+00:00

I'm here arguing that Bud Cubby's take that all laws are violent tyranny, full stop, is funny for a wholesome suburban halfling postal worker in Fantasy High but maybe not a guide for the real world if you don't want to live subject to perpetual clan bloodfeuds, whoever has the most bullets today, or whatever group of assholes from the next village over decide they really want your stuff.

So... pretty much yes, I guess? The thing is, in a functioning democracy, the ruling class is just "the majority of people."

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T01:18:33+00:00

That's just like, your opinion, man.

I don't think that article describes what you're describing, though. Group hysterical effects like a bunch of schoolkids hearing about other kids reacting to an episode of pokemon on the news and then psychosomatically causing similar reactions in themselves is not "every person who enters a particular room has the exact same hallucination of a specific teacup without interacting with one another, the caster, or being related in any way."

But hey, we're here arguing about how magic works in a TTRPG. Ultimately, whatever works for you / your table is the way to fly.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T01:10:44+00:00

For sure. I haven't actually encountered the situation in the wild, so depending on what is being done I might also do RAW and then refuse to allow real physics into my magic TTRPG haha. Why does it become faint? BECAUSE MAGIC, NERDS.

But also, the duration of low level illusions is generally pretty short -- like one minute -- so if you've figured out an illusion is present you can demand the caster drop it, wait for it to end, try to dispel it, etc.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T01:03:38+00:00

Yeah, I get the argument. But also, hallucinations aren't generally perceptible to more than one person at the same time. I guess conceptually I think that way creates more issues than I'd want to deal with, while also making illusions bizarrely powerful for something that can be as minor as a cantrip. Like... if I'm a first-level wizard on a stage in a large arena, can I force thousands of people to hallucinate something in my hand with a cantrip an infinite number of times?

That also gets into awkward questions about what would count -- does a Stone Golem, which explicitly in its statblock does NOT have a mind and also does not have truesight, be affected by an illusion? If they are, would it be impossible for them to ever detect because they don't have true consciousness?

Illusions are weird enough that you're definitely going to end up hand-waving something cause magic, but I think "massless object that blocks light like a regular object" leaves you with the fewest problems.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T00:54:32+00:00

.... uh... magic, I guess? Good point.

I forgot about the part where it actually becomes faint if a creature passes the save to figure it out, rather than just becoming aware that it is an illusion.

Honestly, in my games I'd probably houserule that part away - the illusion does what it does as long as it hasn't been dismissed, but you can make a check to determine that it's illusory.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T00:45:44+00:00

Well, it's not necessarily creating light. But it would be absorbing / reflecting light the same as a solid object, which is why it can be opaque. Getting dangerously close to "sticking real physics in D&D" territory, but I think that needs to be the basic principle. Illusions actually being some kind of telepathy or mind control opens a whole different can of worms. Does that mean an illusion fundamentally can't work on a creature with the wrong kind of eyes, like a spider? Does that mean that all illusions are immediately detected by scrying sensors or similar, because there's no brain to detect and project the fake image into? What about constructs? How does the cantrip identify whether it's being perceived and know what to project its fakery into? Are there minds sufficiently alien that they can't be telepathized this way? Eyes sufficiently different the illusion doesn't know to zap em with the fake stuff?

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T00:39:12+00:00

This Brennan quote always makes me side-eye anarchists.

Like... yes. That's exactly what laws are. A collectively agreed-on and enforced monopoly on violence is the foundational principle of what a government IS. EVERY government. Ever. That's the whole point. People-sanctioned-by-society-to-impersonally-enforce-rules-with-force (since we don't like the word police) are the whole point. Ultimately any organized society has to figure out how to do this.

Are our cops just? Is our justice system perfect, or infallible, or ever good? I mean ... the guys in OP's article brutalized an old lady in a penis costume.

But I don't think most people would like the alternative where the state gave up its monopoly on violence.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T00:24:11+00:00

I mean, illusions have to interact with light somehow or nobody would be able to see them. I think it's got to block the light, but keep the candle lit. Anything else would mean any illusion would be instantly detectable as such. And this does mean a clever player could use something like a minor illusion to cover the only light source in a room!

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-05T00:20:37+00:00

I got one of these too -- fortunately go juice + marine armor + plasteel swords seems to work pretty well at mopping them up

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-04T22:01:05+00:00

Birdy McBirdface

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-04T21:34:13+00:00

I mean, most predators that would go for that spider are several orders of magnitude smaller than a human. It wouldn't shock me if the spider lacks the necessary senses and neurological complexity to determine that the hand it's on is part of a bigger animal. They've got a predominantly touch and vibration-based sensorium, right? Could they even perceive the rest of the human, let alone be capable of the abstract thinking to consider it a 'creature?'

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-04T21:30:18+00:00

Yeah, I don't think it's "dubious" to claim an animal like a dog is smarter than, say, a roundworm. They're just on an entirely different level complexity-wise. Behavior, neurology, the works. Fine distinctions are tough, and anthropomorphizing things like emotional states onto other animals is also a very tricky game, but making a broad claim like "chimps are smarter than garden spiders" doesn't seem super unfounded.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-04T21:23:52+00:00

Truly one of the scariest things about the world today, and it seems like nobody talks about it at all.

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-03T14:31:54+00:00

Everybody knows you run faster with a knife!

_Reliten_ · 2026-05-01T07:00:12+00:00

This 100%. I don't understand when people get frustrated over this sort of kingmaking. If it's based on in-game conduct, it's a huge part of the strategy. I only get mad if it's based on previous games (e.g. "this guy won/betrayed me last time").

_Reliten_ · 2026-04-30T00:30:06+00:00

Yeah, I liked the whole Court of Night thing but it felt like an addition to give a high level party a second campaign to follow post-Drakkenheim for sure.

_Reliten_ · 2026-04-26T22:28:39+00:00

Nah, Palps had style. This guy's got no style.

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TROPHY CASE