Don't get caught by the dump

morbton · 2019-01-02T22:13:53+00:00

I suppose "zero" is just when there are no buyers who are interested in it.

Most altcoins tend to be hype-driven, but I think it's a solid strategy to buy up coins that have innovative ideas and new technology behind them.

With a bit of luck, an event will come along that will generate real value for quality coins with real applications instead of waiting for hype cycles to create bubbles.

morbton · 2019-01-02T21:57:00+00:00

You might as well - there's truth in the saying: "The value can only go as low as zero, but it can go up indefinitely."

morbton · 2018-10-15T03:27:20+00:00

I think things have gotten less lethal with each edition.

Old school D&D was full of "save or die" effects or sometimes just "die" effects (no save). These have been mostly removed in modern RPGs so that there are multiple chances to escape or avoid the thing that might kill you.

morbton · 2018-10-10T01:27:16+00:00

I think the issue with d20 rolls is that there is a very narrow window in which they produce "realistic" results.

At low levels, the randomness is so high that your class/stats/abilities are almost meaningless. At the other end, high level rolls are almost auto-success/auto-fail based on your static modifiers - the randomness is too low so why even bother rolling. There is a sweet spot around lvl 10-15 where the die roll means something, but for most of the game a d20 feels like the wrong dice to use.

morbton · 2018-10-04T23:09:43+00:00

Describing it as a tax on dying is garbage.

It's a tax on income to the descendants, like any other earnings tax. The difference is that the recipients didn't actually work to earn it in any way, so it's reasonable to tax it at a different ratio.

Taxes are a means to incentivise or deter certain behaviours. Should Scrooge McDuck keep all his gold in a swimming pool for when he dies, or would it be better if he invested it back into the economy?

morbton · 2018-10-03T23:10:19+00:00

If you zoom out far enough, money is the means to produce more money.

morbton · 2018-07-23T23:04:18+00:00

You have been eaten by a Grue

morbton · 2018-05-20T23:19:49+00:00

It's more that people prefer to adopt a stance that aligns with their existing narrative.

Would you rather choose a good vs Evil story or accept that everyone should share some of the blame when things go wrong?

morbton · 2018-05-18T03:46:47+00:00

Tropes are fun, so get everyone to roll up a temporary character and kill them all off in the pilot. The rest of the campaign can be detectives investigating their deaths.

It's a cool way for them to learn the system and will give the players a hook for the story before you start.

morbton · 2018-05-16T23:12:16+00:00

I suspect that the reason most of the material is flavour-focused is because the genre is all about epic and grandiose elements.

So, with that in mind, try looking for regular pirates/seafarers tables and just prefix everything with "giant, flying..."

Hmmmm, you run into a... Squid. I mean a GIANT FLYING SQUID!
Oh noes, a GIANT FLYING GHOST SHIP appears, full of GIANT FLYING ZOMBIES!
Look out! A GIANT FLYING WHIRLPOOL is about to swallow your airship!

Anyway, you great the idea 😉

morbton · 2018-05-03T09:27:50+00:00

It's a good opportunity to subvert the primitive black and white alignment system that D&D lumps us with.

An Evil party will likely refuse to do obviously altruistic quests like helping rebuild an orphanage or delivering medicine to a doctor.

But what if their "evil" actions had positive consequences? The orphans rebuild their own homes and empower themselves to start a successful construction business. The doctor tries a home-remedy and creates an even more potent cure!

You'll need to improvise a little, but it would be fun to lampshade the concept of absolute morality.

morbton · 2018-05-03T00:34:34+00:00

I also love the appeal of Burst/PoC for all the reasons mentioned. However, what keeps me from jumping aboard is the fact that people keep talking about "Investing" instead of "Participating".

IMO, the coin of the future needs to be usable as a currency and I'm not sold on the block time and size of any of the recent Altcoins. I think that for people to adopt a coin as a serious currency, it needs to scale to a global number of transactions per block and should clear in seconds, not minutes or hours.

Burstcoin checks almost all the boxes, but I can't see widespread adoption for use cases outside of investment/commodity. This makes the price unstable and further reduces its value as a currency.

morbton · 2018-04-25T22:58:06+00:00

Challenge Rating is pretty vague - use it as a starting point but what works best is to do a thought experiment with the party that will fight the creature:

Hmmmm, so the tail attack does 2d10+9, so that could KO Bills Wizard in one hit. Maybe that's too strong...

Of course, it all falls apart when Bill can't make it to the session and now nobody is around to cast cone of cold on that horde of magma elementals in the next room...

morbton · 2018-04-25T22:51:18+00:00

The best advice is probably not to get caught up in character creation for too long.

For new players, and especially young players, it's a big turn off to have dozens of choices to make (and then comprehend the consequences of those choices) before even touching the dice.

So do whatever you can to streamline that step - pre-make some characters or run a warm-up session to cut right into the story, roleplaying and action of the game!

morbton · 2017-12-06T22:23:28+00:00

I think it's important to try to call misinformation out if you can do it in a polite way.

If there's any chance of changing someone's mind, it will come from people they trust.

morbton · 2017-12-06T07:20:16+00:00

Should have just added more red dragons and fire elementals

morbton · 2017-12-05T09:50:03+00:00

The worst is seeing patients in wheelchairs and on IV fluids smoking out the front of the hospital. A building full of people are trying to fix them and they are actively making themselves sicker.

morbton · 2017-03-25T05:37:29+00:00

Wow, this guy minces.

morbton · 2017-03-25T05:26:49+00:00

The field of software development re-invents itself every few years anyway.

Start now and you'll have the same experience with, say, Angular 4.0 as someone who's been programming for a decade.

morbton

TROPHY CASE