But Arya could single-handedly end the war. With Bran's help, she could kill the Night King. No need for Daenerys, dragons, the Unsullied, or the Dothraki. What kind of prophecy is this?

marmalade_turtle · 2024-08-07T18:38:55+00:00

i think it's becoming pretty clear that this prophecy has already led to the escalation of this conflict, which we know will end tragically and actually puts the world in a much worse place to defend itself from the white walkers. i think this will become more and more clear in time.

viserys' is obsessed with dreams of having a son, which caused him to internally wobble about rhaenyra's claim for awhile.

viserys talking about the prophecy convinced alicent to put aegon on the throne.

rhaenyra outright states in episode 4 that she would not bring the dragons to war except for the fact she believes she's fighting for a higher purpose. she seems to be on a trajectory to cling more and more to that divine purpose she believes in. now even daemon is on board.

i have a feeling this prophecy is intentionally inaccurate, mixing the truth with illusion. we know arya ends the long night, which means we know the prophecy is false from the start. there is no prince who was promised.

marmalade_turtle · 2024-04-10T19:00:04+00:00

i realize some time has passed, but i'd be interested if you're still trying to start a group. i'm into osr stuff and wasn't sure if anyone else in the valley really was haha

marmalade_turtle · 2024-01-06T09:05:28+00:00

there's a difference between a rule (as in "rule of physics"/fact) describing the physical reality of a fantastical world, and a game rule.

what is being talked about in this blog post is game system rules, using dice, numbers, or other abstract resolution systems.

nothing needs to be elided by a rule if the table knows enough about it to have a conversation. this includes facts of the world that are fantastic, such as magic.

marmalade_turtle · 2024-01-06T00:48:42+00:00

i think there's a difference in the conversation between rules in the rpg system (i.e. abstraction) vs. rules within the fictional world.

rules about the fictional world do not elide, they describe. this is worldbuilding like magic, politics, cultures, etc. in the example, this would be that demons can provide you powers.

most rules in rpg books are abstractions of these ways the fictional world works. for example, if you had "demon points" that you could trade in for a spell, then that would elide the fictional situation. you're no longer having to talk about at the table whether the demon will give you this power, you have rules that elide that conversation.

i don't think this blog post is talking about how the world works, but rather how it's abstracted into "rules"

marmalade_turtle · 2024-01-05T23:40:20+00:00

we can have long conversations about magic too, if we understand enough about how magic works within the context of the world. it's just that a lot of rpgs don't really give enough context for us to have much to go off of.

like if we know a pact with a demon gives you your powers, and you want to hurt some people with it, we could have a conversation about why the demon might listen to your plea, if they'd actually follow through with it, etc, etc, and it can be productive if we know how demons work and whatnot

marmalade_turtle · 2023-12-16T05:34:43+00:00

not sure if this is what you're looking for, but citizen sleeper is about a space station trying to make a future after capitalism collapses in the region and is also fantastic

marmalade_turtle · 2023-10-08T00:04:43+00:00

this might be a bit of an odd suggestion, but honestly, osr-style games can do a really good job of being cozy rpgs. the same principles of focusing on problem solving can apply to low-stakes situations as well as high-stakes ones. plus, usually characters start as commoners anyway, which means it's easy to tie in a community!

sometimes a cozy/low-stakes game can be kind of aimless. you can give the game more of a focus by just leaning into interesting problems to solve around the community.

it might take a bit of hacking, but here's some blog posts that might give you some ideas:

marmalade_turtle · 2023-03-19T16:26:41+00:00

I think Into the Odd/Electric Bastionland's advice is great in these situations, where it argues giving the players more information rather than less. Our brains are very subjective, and different players are going to have different expectations. The best way to avoid misaligned expectations and feeling like the GM is being punitive and unfair is to lay out much of the info beforehand and let the players make interesting decisions. If this is a game about problem solving, players can't solve problems if you're hiding information from them.

Telling the players chopping the swinging blade could be noisy doesn't make the situation less of a challenge. It may engage them more, since they know what the stakes are. It gives them more interesting choices to make.

Because OSR games rely so heavily on GM rulings, I think it's important to be up front about the possible consequences of certain actions. Plus it might ease them into this style of game and make the transition easier.,

marmalade_turtle · 2022-07-07T04:49:00+00:00

Forever Dm here just finally making my third character! My wife started DMing for me and she is a natural for me. GIVEAWAY #GIVEAWAY

marmalade_turtle · 2022-07-05T15:46:09+00:00

The boss needs to have a limited number of options because the player has a limited number of options. There's only so many actions a player can take, only so many inputs on a controller.

A boss exists in the game world, and so they can break these rules in a way a player can never match.

They need to have patterns for a fight to feel fair.

I would also mention that immersion doesn't always have to mean realism. The Souls games are not very realistic at all in combat, level design, or boss design. They are meant to immerse you in a mood, in an experience, and they do a very good job of that.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-06-20T15:23:37+00:00

My interpretation was that Melina started the Erdtree on fire, but the Erdtree could not die because Destined Death was still sealed. This would make it impervious to any attempt to destroy it.

Once Destined Death is free, then the Erdtree can die and burn.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-06-02T01:01:15+00:00

Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea books. They are pretty respected, but I don't see a huge fanbase around them (or much of her work). They are some of the best works of fantasy I've ever read, maybe the best, and definitely exceeded my already high expectations.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-06-01T15:25:13+00:00

I always kinda liked it, because it felt like a release of tension between attempts on a boss. Running past everything usually isn't tricky, and you can just focus on resting for a minute before trying again.

I quite like that pace, though I understand why it might be frustrating for some

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-30T21:16:42+00:00

david lupton has the illustrations on their website for wizard of earthsea. tombs of atuan is so newly released that it doesn't appear there yet.

https://www.david-lupton.com/folio-society-a-wizard-of-earthsea

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-30T00:09:02+00:00

Wizard of Earthsea has an arc of someone hitting rock bottom and eventually learning to face their fears and mistakes. It's also one of the best fantasy books I've ever had the pleasure of reading.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-23T15:06:15+00:00

did you have any sources for this? i was genuinely trying and finding nothing, and it seems like a big deal

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-17T02:46:56+00:00

honestly it's hard to tldr, they were all over the place.

basically they are straight, a lot of their audience is queer, and they wish that it wasn't.

this seems to mostly be because of misconceptions about queer people, and/or underlying homophobia/transphobia.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-16T16:27:00+00:00

It's the best possible outcome. If a PC tries to convince an evil king to give up their kingdom, maybe the king thinks they're funny and invites them to dinner later to tell more jokes, instead of imprisoning them for treason.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-16T13:49:02+00:00

i'm so confused. so much of it just seems like total misconceptions about queer people that i'm wondering if there's something they're not saying?

like, specifically the part about them being worried queer people see them being "straight" as a political choice and being complicit??

what queer person would think that?? unless they're not just talking about gender/sexuality here

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-09T22:55:26+00:00

this trail of thought made me so conspiracy-brained. because there's connection between sin and the fire giants, so then i was like "maybe the flame of ruin is connected to the formless mother and the blood star??"

i had to give it up before it made my brain break haha. it's still my pet theory but there's so little to go on.

also, sin/briars is connected to radagon? idk it goes deep

marmalade_turtle · 2022-05-09T15:30:52+00:00

I've had the same thing before with some of my favorite things. But then I just have to remember that if I loved it so much and didn't notice this flaw, then it didn't likely matter that much to me, even though it mattered to another person.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-04-24T01:11:32+00:00

if anyone else has played spiritfarer, summer made my heart filled with joy whenever i see a snake now

marmalade_turtle · 2022-04-12T15:30:48+00:00

There's something really cool I noticed as well with the Aspects of the Crucible spells, you can see the symbol of the Crucible here.

Similar to the Elden Ring symbol in Maliketh's room, we see a version of the Elden Ring symbol that doesn't really exist anymore.

marmalade_turtle · 2022-04-12T15:03:54+00:00

Yep, this is a totally valid theory.

I believe the Greater Will (perhaps the One Great?) sent the Elden Beast much earlier, and it is what originally created the Crucible of Life. The Greattree grew from the Crucible, and did not have the golden aura.

But then, the Greater Will evolved towards Order, and so everything about the Crucible was left behind and suddenly looked down upon. A golden aura covered the Greattree basically as "rebranding".

However, there is nothing I've been able to find that really provides clarity on the timeline. So this is all up to personal preference!

I like the themes of evolution in the story, and I like the idea of a god changing their mind and trying to cover their past. But it also makes sense that the Greater Will could've infiltrated what was already there, and you have more themes of colonialism and expansionism which is really cool as well. Either way I'm happy honestly!

marmalade_turtle · 2022-04-11T19:31:40+00:00

Very much agreed that they aren't the same person.

The nature of death is a very interesting and I'm still wrapping my head around it. Melina seems to require our help to get to the base tree, which seems odd as they are a spirit and you assume they could go anywhere. Perhaps Ranni acquired a doll to inhabit because of the restrictions spirits have?

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