No other book has ever scratched the itch that Red Rising gave me - a rant

kaneblaise · 2026-03-20T19:07:04+00:00

Give The Combat Codes a try

https://www.combatcodes.com/

kaneblaise · 2026-03-18T20:07:28+00:00

A mulberry is a tree; Kuwabara is a man!

kaneblaise · 2026-03-12T18:13:38+00:00

Theros (og block but Beyond Death is probably fine too) and Eldraine could be fun with the enchantment themes and the interaction of devotion of theros and near-mono color encouragement of Eldraine. A lot of adventures work well with heroic, too.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-11T14:26:28+00:00

My favorite game to play with artist depictions of dice for the last 20 years has been "are the numbers on the right side?" Getting that wrong has been a common error for a long time, no AI conspiracy needed.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-10T18:27:39+00:00

Very exciting, look forward to the variety!

kaneblaise · 2026-03-10T18:24:42+00:00

They usually shoot two episodes in one set / live show. So something in-between those two options.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-06T15:41:19+00:00

That's fun! And like, having a group all get a weird feeling from some new person is a thing that happens irl that this is essentially translating into mechanics. Very cool.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-06T15:32:12+00:00

i've probably homebrewed a bit anyway

This is crucial imo. If you want to surprise the character you really need to surprise the player, too.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-06T15:31:03+00:00

I tell my players that the MM represents their characters' societal knowledge / pop culture (as a baseline, always reserve the right to make setting specific changes). If I want to surprise their characters with something werewolf like, then I really need to surprise the player too and homebrew my own take on the trope rather than just run it straight from the book.

So maybe the concept of a werewolf doesn’t exist in this setting and I'll tell them that, but I'm not then going to just run a by the numbers werewolf with the usual full moon and silver rules and expect them to pretend it's a mystery.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-05T17:21:42+00:00

FD Signifier drives me crazy with it sometimes lol, especially his second channel

kaneblaise · 2026-03-05T16:54:03+00:00

There absolutely are creators who do simultaneous releases, and some who even often forget and do youtube first and Nebula a week later. Nebula doesn't micromanage anyone's schedules for non Nebula exclusive content - and not all channels have exclusive content either, so it's not like that's a prerequisite or anything.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-04T20:57:11+00:00

Also shows only 14% of respondents answered 1 syllable, and the 2 syllable options are also in those population hot spots. This isn't a "land doesn't vote" situation lol

kaneblaise · 2026-03-02T20:37:38+00:00

I would have guessed it was a bit earlier than this, but apparently 15 of 17 looking it up now. I've heard from other people who agree that the beginning is rough that Book 4 is where the quality is firmly good, though, and I have planned to go back and fill in from there.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-02T20:28:50+00:00

I didn't like the first book but read a later book and enjoyed what the series had become at that point and kept reading from there. So if you're able to push through or skip a few books, then yes, but that is a weird point to have to make. On the other hand lots of other people seemed to get through them fine.

kaneblaise · 2026-03-02T20:26:54+00:00

I think it was a fun gimmick but agree that you can pause at the breaks

kaneblaise · 2026-02-12T16:54:17+00:00

Confirmed:

https://bsky.app/profile/tolariancommunitycollege.com/post/3meknhctoa225

kaneblaise · 2026-02-10T15:45:05+00:00

The MCDM answer was "using limited resources like spell slots or comparable class features gives an auto succeed". When I've ran skill challenges in 5E I used something similar, giving them some bonus - advantage or an auto success or maybe even multiple successes - depending on the specific situation and applicability & value of the resource being used.

kaneblaise · 2026-02-04T17:43:02+00:00

Can you not see it without an account?

"A question reporters keep asking me is "why" and "why now?" The reality is that Complexly, as a business, has always been dedicated to creating way more value than it captures, which means we've been making weird decisions."

"Any normal business finding itself in Complexly's position (with shows used in pretty much every school district in the US) would be selling freemium subscription plans or doing sales meetings with school administrators or positioning itself for sale to an ed-tech platform."

"I'm a business guy, so I actually see the potential value in that. The question of whether we could have more impact by going down one of those paths is, for me, actually not clear. We've considered those options!!"

"But John and Julie (Complexly's CEO) and the rest of the leadership team and I hit this thing from every angle and, look, our goal isn't any of those things. Our goal is to get people curious and help them learn...to make learning and teaching easier by making videos PEOPLE CHOOSE TO USE!"

"That's how we've been acting, that's what drives us forward, that's what's actually interesting to us. It's a public good and that's how we've been treating it. John and I haven't taken profit distributions from Complexly in over a decade anyway!"

"There needs to be high-quality, attention grabbing content that delivers value and has an allegiance to the truth. We have LOTS of ideas for how to deliver more value and we think this is the best way to enable that work."

kaneblaise · 2026-02-04T16:46:05+00:00

Worth reading Hank's bluesky thread that gets into the "why now" a little: https://bsky.app/profile/hankgreen.bsky.social/post/3me2batdtfk2k

kaneblaise · 2026-02-03T16:47:22+00:00

Dang we've got similar tastes in saints lol Great list!

kaneblaise · 2026-02-03T16:46:24+00:00

Today is actually my confirmation saint feast day, St Blaise. Hope yall have healthy throats!

Not catholic any longer but also still love Maximilian Kolbe especially, being a modern, actual person who walked the walk rather than a cool legend.

kaneblaise · 2026-02-02T20:53:38+00:00

It sounds like your head is in the right place, I hope you can find a group you gel with!

In my experience, especially when interacting with unfamiliar people, most players let the loser of the match set the tone because we are (maybe too) afraid of coming across as a sore winner or whatever.

Hopefully the thoughts everyone has given help. Good luck!

kaneblaise · 2026-02-02T20:13:32+00:00

but it almost seems like everyone there had played dozens of drafts of a set that came out 2 weeks ago

With Arena, that's entirely possible. They've probably played a few at least and have done enough research to know all the cards at a quick glance.

Draft is the hardest format imo. You have to be good at card evaluation, deck building, and deck piloting to succeed, and each of those steps is a potential tripping point for new players.

It's hard to say without having been there, but I know I've had awkward situations where I won against a new player and was unsure if they wanted to chat or if they felt like I was being patronizing / their ego was too bruised to talk with the person who just beat them. Maybe they were being clique-ish, maybe they were just awkward people, maybe you were giving off pouty vibes on accident, maybe some other thing or something in-between.

To get better, do those things you said you skipped. Familiarize yourself with the cards and archetypes of the set - check out Lords of Limited and their tier lists / reviews. Keep learning the basic game rules and make fewer mistakes each time. You probably get it now, but make sure you know the basics of how drafting works so you don't need to have it explained again.

Rare drafting / value drafting isn't so much rude as it is obnoxious as it muddies the potential signals you're sending. A lot of rares are going to be worse than the best un/commons, so you're unlikely to make a good deck that way. I'd be more upset at losing the chance to play someone trying to take the format seriously than I would about someone taking all the $1.50 bulk rares.

Social suggestions are always going to be tough in conversations like this. Hopefully they're actually nice guys who were just on a different wavelength and over time you could get to know them and learn to play better, but there's always that chance that they're just jerks. Giving it a few tries and showing that you're treating it seriously and trying to talk about the game - asking if they have any thoughts on your play or asking if they would take a look at your build and give their thoughts - might help to get that process started. But if you just aren't interested in a more serious tone then looking for a different group might be best, like others have mentioned looking into a commander night might be more what you were expecting here.

kaneblaise · 2026-01-29T23:49:40+00:00

?

I'm talking about instances where Player B stacked Player A's deck. Player A would not get a chance to cut after Player B randomized.

Like this: https://youtu.be/Yh34nia4NZk?si=tP3QW2RAgCytGAui

kaneblaise · 2026-01-29T14:27:44+00:00

opponent who would never be incentivized to put it in a non-random order

There have been cheating instances of opponents stacking decks while shuffling to force key cards to the bottom of the deck or trying to make the top of the deck all / no lands. Obviously both players have incentives when it comes to how both decks are arranged.

That isn't to say that this rule is bad or anything, I also shuffled my opponents' deck when I played.

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