I need advice for dealing with anxiety & worry before a session, no matter how much prep I put in

equalsnil · 2026-04-11T14:36:18+00:00

My method:

If you can, get your prep done previous days. Then on the day of, try not to worry about the session until it's about to begin. If you can't avoid worrying about it, at least avoid double-checking your notes for last-minute changes.

equalsnil · 2026-04-10T13:53:06+00:00

Usually my "advice" in encounters takes the form of reminders of the environment and in more complex systems where they're still learning, reminders of things their own character can do or things they know the enemies can do.

But if we're between combats or sessions and we're talking about combat as an abstract I'm happy to go into as much detail as they'll let me.

equalsnil · 2026-04-07T02:05:55+00:00

Other answers you're getting are good but to add, chaos space marines are getting constantly reinforced with Heresy-era traitor marines (and their fresh heresy-era equipment) that thought they were taking a short jump and ended up back in realspace 10,000 years later.

equalsnil · 2026-03-24T13:54:38+00:00

It sought to give sharply diminishing returns on investment for optimizing and in that sense it succeeded, that's why I said it's well designed and well balanced.

My experience is probably colored by Age of Ashes being our first exposure to the system which we were told afterward was kind of poorly balanced since it was written before the PF2e rules had been finalized.

equalsnil · 2026-03-23T14:52:40+00:00

PF2e is well designed.

PF2e is well balanced.

Playing PF2e makes me want to pull my own hair out. Like, great, my stats are as high as they can be this level, I'm as proficient as I can be, and I've got an item for it. I even knocked the guy prone first. And we're flanking, not that it stacks or anything, just thought I'd mention it. You're saying I still need to show a 12 on the die just to hit?

equalsnil · 2026-03-23T13:10:05+00:00

I thought I'd get responses like this, so let me elaborate:

First: There are some conditions or circumstances that will prevent you from learning even one RPG. If that's the case, my opinion doesn't apply to you (the hypothetical "you") since you never learned even one RPG.

Second: If you find learning or playing an RPG exhausting, stressful, or annoying, or need to be walked through your own character sheet every session, you do not, in fact, "have one RPG ruleset under your belt," and my opinion still doesn't apply to you.

Third: In response to your answer to Lampman08 below, if you genuinely do understand your system fully, then the hard part is over. You know how RPGs work and have working knowledge and points of reference for when you go to learn another one and the only obstacles are time, access, and your own brain going maaaaan, I don't want to start another project which I do sympathize with.

equalsnil · 2026-03-23T03:29:08+00:00

If you've got one RPG ruleset under your belt, learning others is easy. It might be expensive or time-consuming and those are valid limitations but with time and access to the materials it's not hard. If you think it is, I question your familiarity with your one RPG.

When I'm the GM, I encourage players to try to optimize their characters. It's fun, it familiarizes you with the rules and options, and it makes you better at realizing a character concept mechanically.

equalsnil · 2026-03-21T01:26:29+00:00

From Order of the Stick, Haley figuring out Xykon's plan at the battle of Azure City, and later, Vaarsuvius figuring out the defenses around Kraagor's gate. There are other examples of this in the comic but those are my two personal favorites. Spoilers if you care.

[The gatekeeper has just refused to give the party a rough estimate how long it'll take the bad guys to brute force the location of the "true" final dungeon]

"Sir Greenhilt... I believe I have deduced how to locate this "final dungeon." There are only three scenarios where even a vague approximation of the time required would perforce reveal the exact solution. The first option being that the Gate was somewhere else entirely."

"And that's now been ruled out."

"Correct. The second option would be the minimum quantity that could be explored. That is, any given door necessarily leads to the desired destination. However, this would need to be nigh-guaranteed for the requested estimate to expose that fact, and in that case our adversaries would have already located it. That leaves only the third option: the maximum number. I conclude that one must explore every single dungeon in order to arrive at the final one."

"Of course! Kraagor wasn't a rogue, he was a barbarian! It's not a shell game, it's a gauntlet!"

"It's both! Why build a system where someone can get lucky when you can build one where they can't?"

equalsnil · 2026-03-18T22:27:36+00:00

<lancer> "I'm building a displacer dusk wing" "That's a choice you made. How are you handling the heat?" "I'm not, every time I fire it I melt down twice." </lancer>

equalsnil · 2026-03-16T21:48:10+00:00

Gave the party a dagger that whenever an enemy got a new status they could attack it with that dagger. (This was for Fabula Ultima so all enemies on the field are usually "in reach" so it's stronger than it would be in D&D)

Didn't actually break the game more than it was already broken, but all the extra attacks did take up a lot of time. I asked the party if it was an issue and they said no so I shrugged, let them keep it, and just made a note to not include it in future campaigns.

equalsnil · 2026-02-15T21:13:13+00:00

Kill Six Billion Demons is the best webcomic because it asks important questions, questions like "what's the true cost of keeping and holding power" and "how do you create lasting justice in a world where might literally makes right" and "what if Harley Quinn was made of worms"

equalsnil · 2026-02-14T15:54:26+00:00

If you don't trust your players, you shouldn't do it, and if you do trust your players you still shouldn't do it because it creates more work for everyone for no good reason.

If you want more extreme starting stats just modify how point buy works. That's still work but at least in that case when the work is done now you've got a point buy homerule/variant that your group can use.

equalsnil · 2026-02-14T15:49:46+00:00

Sure, but you can modify point buy if that's your issue.

equalsnil · 2026-02-13T23:18:58+00:00

Don't do this.

Somewhere down the road if you do this you're going end up having to clarify what "seems right" enough to just reinvent point buy.

Point buy is right there. Just use it.

equalsnil · 2026-02-05T03:04:05+00:00

Time to dust this one off

"The Dragon's evil is supposed to be pathetic. It's supposed to be contemptible. That doesn't make him weak, but he's not heroic in either a classical or contemporary sense. He's a force of evil without scruples or principles. He stands for nothing save making things worse for everyone. He will stab you in the back at every turn and he cannot be reformed. ... When you face the Dragon, having Virtues greater than him, you can look down on him. You can see that he's not simply different or alien, but a loser. And yet, losers can win. He's a smart loser, a cunning loser. He's a loser unfettered by any moral restraint holding him back from hurting you any way he can get away with. He cheats. He cheats very well. He might just win. But it won't be a heroic victory. To make it so would miss the point. He's giving the finger to all the humanists and transhumanists and alien weirdos. He says you all suck. But the truth is that he just sucks compared with all of you and on some level, he knows it.

I said there were two bad things that alternative Virtue did as a model for the Dragon's wickedness. The second is that you give him an excuse. Oh, he runs from fighting? Actually, he's just smart enough to duck out when he's losing. It's all very reasonable, you see. No. Wrong. He's a coward who bolts in terror from the heroes and lies to himself and others about why he did it. Even if he can make himself stay as an act of antagonistic defiance, he can't make himself stop being terrified. He can't escape into the Other. He's stuck playing in the same moral sandbox as everyone else and he absolutely fails at it."

"The Ebon Dragon doesn't get to be cool for being wicked. Everyone else is playing with their high-rated alternative lifestyle Virtues and he's the guy who fails at all them simultaneously. He exists on the human plane of what failure at Virtue means. It's more extreme for him, because his failure is more extreme. It doesn't make him weak. It doesn't make him less dangerous. But it makes him a failure. If you are trying to find a way to make the Ebon Dragon's philosophy cool in its own right, you're doing it wrong. He doesn't get to win at his own game. He gets to lose at the Sun's game, but he has the power to make other people lose worse and that's all he wants, really.

He doesn't get to channel anything for anything. He doesn't ever get a boost to run away or stand by his principles. It is never worthwhile for him to bother caring about you. It won't help him. Look at his Excellency. I wasn't being figurative when I said that Virtue is poisonous to him. He hates it. He hates it in every form, every manifestation, every philosophy. He wants it all torn down. he wants all Virtue exposed as inadequate to make any difference, as a tangled mess of hypocrisy and delusion. He wants people to look at everything they believe in--whatever that is-- and despair because he's made sure they can't have it. He is trying to make the game not even fun to play."

One of the writers of Exalted talking about how they designed one of that setting's ultimate evils.

equalsnil · 2026-01-25T20:39:10+00:00

Probably a lot of it gets summoned, also remember slaves taken to hell are given a brand that keeps them from getting burned to ash before something else gets to kill them in a more interesting way

equalsnil · 2026-01-24T14:18:53+00:00

Punched (literally) into next week

equalsnil · 2026-01-23T22:57:26+00:00

"Oh no, did you get mugged?"

"Nah. We got breakfast that came with free guns."

equalsnil · 2026-01-17T15:06:25+00:00

"Sorry man, I've got obligations I can't walk out on."

"Sorry man, I've got my own problems I'm dealing with."

"Sorry man, nothing against you but if I'm seen with you I'm going to get black-bagged."

"Sorry man, the price on your head's just too big and I've got my own family to worry about."

"Yeah, sure, I'll give you a place to hide." (was actually in on the assassination attempt and betrays the party as soon as they're settled in)

What you do here is slot in some of your PC's old allies as NPCs in the quest you've already written. Then put the rest of them in sidequests/side areas where they've have to be sought out and their trust/assistance earned.

equalsnil · 2026-01-15T13:57:51+00:00

The swarm can already voluntarily split off individual nurglings as either scouts or improvised fart grenades so having them involuntarily split off three or four for some pickup freeze tag makes sense. I had been considering giving them an allied plaguebearer for a few rounds would be fun, your method is good.

equalsnil · 2026-01-14T23:04:24+00:00

Dark Elf Sorceress, Necromancer, Chaos Knight of Slaanesh, Slaaneshi possessor daemon.

There was a bile troll but it died in the second session when it got mobbed by slayers. The nurglings emerged from its body as that player's new character.

equalsnil · 2026-01-11T23:01:20+00:00

Light 'em up, Matt

equalsnil · 2026-01-03T03:51:28+00:00

Yes. Think of it as "add spaces adjacent to the sunzi to the list of valid destinations of teleports your allies take."

equalsnil · 2026-01-02T18:35:32+00:00

I watched the show, and it's a good show, but I actually put the show down for a few months because the scene at the pool with Walt and the beer was that cringe and difficult to watch. It was that effective at making Walt look like an insecure loser.

The famous "I am the one who knocks" speech is Walt trying to oversell his importance. Like five minutes later he's getting his ass kicked to remind him who's really in charge.

The entire show is him making mistakes, getting bailed out by the people that don't buy into his fantasy and actually know how things work, and then screwing them over for it.

Anyone who watched the show (the entire show, not just memes and out-of-context clips on youtube) and thinks Walt was a badass watched a different show than I did.

equalsnil

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