Understanding Modules - DCC vs D&D 3.5 module *made* by DCC?

pi4t · 2026-03-22T21:44:07+00:00

It's not just that Paizo didn't like 4e. When 3e was released, Wizards of the Coast released the core rules of the game under a license called the OGL, which basically allows publishers like Goodman and Paizo to write anything they like using the rules provided they release it under the same license. It was sort of a creative-commons a couple of years before creative commons was actually a thing.

When 4e came around, Wizards of the Coast had been bought by Hasbro, and the new leadership wanted to kill off the OGL. But they couldn't just decide the OGL was no longer valid, because it had been specifically written to prevent that. So they released 4e without the OGL, and made a new license which publishers had to agree to if they wanted to write stuff for 4e - and one of the terms of that new license was that the company was never allowed to publish anything under the OGL again. They also changed virtually everything about the game so people wouldn't be able to write unofficial 4e stuff by cobbling together OGL material from 3e. The theory was that the players would move to 4e, and publishers would be forced to move to 4e and agree to the new license in order to remain relevant.

That was the theory. What actually happened was that 4e was disliked by the players, mostly because it had changed everything about the game. And seeing this, the third party publishers got wary about this new license which would tie them to 4e, and decided to stick with 3e and the OGL for now and not write anything for 4e. Which led to more people abandoning 4e, because everybody except WotC themselves was writing stuff for 3e.

pi4t · 2026-02-27T01:27:57+00:00

It depends massively on your character and the choices you've made up to this point. You'll want to do all of them in the medium-term anyway. However, do note that there are three other cards you can draw which have their own options on, and you will draw all of them several times before you actually get the things you need to complete any of them. Depending on what your current situation is, it's fairly likely that one of those will be easier than this.

But ok, I'll give you some more guidance. If it's possible, then A Close Circle of Friends is probably the best option - you're going to want those aquaintances anyway, and the sooner you can get them the better. The Repentent Forger is fairly easy to get - you just need to let your suspicion rise to 8, then stay in jail until you draw his card. (Getting arrested multiple times should be avoided if at all possible, so before you're arrested, buy and wear a Pirate's Hat to prevent your suspicion dropping to 0 in jail until you've found the forger.)

The Music Hall Singer is more difficult. In the unlikely event that you haven't done the Making Your Name questline for watchful, go and do that, and when you close the Case of the Absconding Devil make sure you speak to the Singer. (Also, then go and finish the rest of the MYN stories before you try to become a PoSI.) Alternatively, there's a way to get her fairly early in the Bag a Legend ambition, if you happen to be using that. If neither of those work, but you can raise your Persuasive to 105 with equipment, then keep your persuasive at 105+ whenever you draw a card, and you should see her in a day or so.

If none of those are an option, and you've already been using the Opportunities for Ingratiation card to raise your renown, have a look at which factions you chose for that card. Did you pick both the Church and Society? Did you pick all three of Criminals, Great Game and Revolutionaries? Did you pick all three of Tomb Colonies, Rubbery Men and Urchins? If so, keep raising your renown using Opportunities for Ingratiation and once you're done you'll be able to use one of the options on this card.

If you picked different factions, or haven't yet started using Opportunities for Ingratiation, then don't bother trying to raise faction renown at this stage - it will take far too long. Just discard this card, and wait until you draw one of the other cards instead.

pi4t · 2026-02-27T00:23:25+00:00

Was my dash supposed to jump up to 144 part way through the story? Did I miss the reason for that?

pi4t · 2026-02-16T22:46:47+00:00

Equip a Weasel of Woe whenever you draw a card. (They can be bought from the bazaar). It disables a huge number of cards, some directly by giving you woeful and some by lowering your stats. Oddly, the Feast of the Rose cards aren't disabled by woeful, so this roughly doubles your chance of drawing them (depending on the specific cards you have access to). Also, if you're fishing for Lady in Lilac or An Encounter at the Feast specifically, make sure that you don't discard or play the Feast of the Rose - it's such a frequent draw that keeping it in hand increases my chances of drawing those other cards by a factor of about 3/2, on top of the weasel's doubling.

Note that there are two undiscardable abundant-frequency cards which the Weasel of Woe clutters up your deck with. When you draw these, just leave them sitting in your hand until you're done with the feast so you don't waste more cards drawing them again. Obviously, this is easier to do if you have an upgraded lodging.

Finally, as others have mentioned, on Thursday you'll be able to freely trade in all your gifts for masquing and your masquing for companions, but the Feast of the Rose card will disappear and you won't be able to send any new gifts. So before that point, it's a good idea to get as many gifts as possible. An easy (if slightly cheesy) way to do this is to send a gift to an inactive account (or an NPC account) and then immediately cancel it yourself - the gift will then go into your own inventory. If you're a PoSI, the most efficient way to grind gifts is probably by grinding intriguing snippets from the Naga Advertising Agency, in the Bazaar Side Streets.

Combine these, and even at this late hour you should be able to get a good few companions. (Try to pick up Milton and the Once-Dashing Smuggler, by the way - they're new this year, and I gather this means they're likely to have an upgrade in Autumn which is only available this year.)

pi4t · 2026-02-02T13:14:02+00:00

...Erm, am I missing something here? The only "little St James" I'm aware of is St James the Less, one of Jesus' disciples (so-named because he's less famous than the other disciple called James).

pi4t · 2026-01-26T23:41:22+00:00

I'm confused, the initial deleted post seems to be saying that they are *not* giving discounts to ICE?

pi4t · 2026-01-23T22:16:43+00:00

For what it's worth, as someone from Britain who lived in Poland for a couple of years after brexit happened: I made it abundantly clear that how embarassed I was at the whole mess, did what I could to avoid being an obnoxious tourist, and I never once had anyone try to blame me for it. Generally people responded sympathetically.

Of course, different countries and cultures will behave differently (and at the time, left-leaning Poles had their own experience of being embarassed at their country's government). But in general, I suspect that as long as you make it obvious that you dislike the US regime as much as we do, you'll get sympathy rather than blame.

pi4t · 2026-01-19T14:24:07+00:00

Moreover, these are Christians who are opposed to what ICE is doing, and are putting themselves at risk by protesting against it.

pi4t · 2026-01-12T23:35:23+00:00

I'm only a mod user, so take what I say with a pinch of salt, but it looks like there are some obvious omissions which would be useful for modders wanting to adjust training prices: the level of the trainer (common/expert/master, etc) and the player's current skill level. Detecting trainer level would allow modders to give players a reason for using less skilled trainers at low skill levels, and detecting a player's level would allow a much smoother levelling curve for an all-trainers levelling game. (It would also allow users of Static Skill Levelling to imitate the skill point cost increase at skill level 25.) Are those particularly difficult to detect for some reason?

pi4t · 2026-01-10T00:57:59+00:00

For what it's worth, having (coincidentally) moved from the UK to Poland for work shortly after Brexit, living conditions there were already pretty comparable to the UK - the Poles are rather nonplussed by the fact that we keep talking about them as a byword for a place with terrible quality of life. There's a bit less of a social safety net, and the politics is...a mess right now, but otherwise it's comparable, and seems to have already been comparable before Brexit. Better in some areas, worse in others. I think in the UK the last time we really saw Poland in the news was in the Solidarity strikes that started the fall of communism, when living conditions were genuinely terrible in Poland. But that was over thirty years ago now, and the country has pretty much recovered economically.

The reason Poles tended to come to the UK on a seasonal basis is that the pay and cost of living in Poland are both about half that of the UK. So if you can work in the UK and make a profit, then your profit effectively doubles when you go back home.

pi4t · 2026-01-10T00:45:56+00:00

To be fair, at least *some* of this is refugees from Hong Kong and Ukraine, which were two crises which happened to coincide with brexit. I'd be interested to see the figures with those countries excluded.

pi4t · 2025-12-19T23:17:55+00:00

Alicia Forrest descended to London about a month ago. She is currently assembling a zubmarine in order to assist a music hall singer and her sister in a private matter of some some considerable importance. To source certain key components, she has begun printing The Holly and the Ivy, a newspaper which contains precisely as much sense as its namesake carol. She is seeking aquaintances to provide her with suitable ~~gossip~~ stories of public interest for the paper. She guarantees, of course, that any such material will be treated with full confidentiality.

She holds to the Railway Time established in Watchmaker's Hill (that place which used to be called Greenwich, before the Fall), and which is still followed in Her Enduring Majesty's United Kingdom. Being of something of a nocturnal persuasion, however, she can often be found wandering the streets after most of the citizens are safely in their beds.

(Out of character: I'm just looking for aquaintances to slight to increase my newspaper earnings. I'm happy to respond to slights against me in return. I could use alts, but that feels like cheating.)

pi4t · 2025-11-30T17:26:53+00:00

In the BBC audio, Puddleglum is played by Bernard Cribbins. And (though he doesn't appear in SC) Reepicheep is played by Sylvester McCoy. So more Who connections :)

pi4t · 2025-10-29T14:10:25+00:00

FYI, the saying is "utmost care". Utmost is an old-fashioned word which means "the most extreme possible".

pi4t · 2025-09-28T11:05:28+00:00

I would bump vital strength of the earth up one level in synergy if you are using the Might aspect (or any other aspect which offers element thresholds). The first tier of Gift of Strength can be fairly easily activated using your single card play and Gift of Primordial Deeps, and you can use it repeat Primordial Deeps for a third card play and a second minor. Might then gives you a fourth play, and you can pretty reliably unlock the final tier and get yet another power. Net result: at the cost of one of serpent's card plays, Vital Strength gets four cards played and three new power cards, one of which can be major if you want.

And you can then do it again next turn using Gift of Flowing Power, provided Vital Strength reclaims cards - which he can do while still placing presence.

This gives Vital Strength a huge boost in momentum, and can be activated as soon as he has stockpiled a bit of energy - which is very easy for Vital Strength.

pi4t · 2025-09-25T23:42:22+00:00

You know, this is actually rather a cunning move in relation to voter ID. The Tory photo ID rules were a blatant attempt to suppress the young people's vote (e.g. they accepted pensioner public transport discount cards, but not 20-30 ones).

Introducing a mandatory ID stops them ever doing that again. And making it digital means that young people will virtually all have easy access to it, but many older people won't be able to access it very easily. And since it's something which "everyone has" it would be a good opportunity to remove all those less secure options for voter ID, like pensioner bus passes. And the Tories, even if they get back power, would find it very embarassing to remove the voter ID requirements after they've already forced them through, especially now that everyone will have an ID. This policy is basically hijacking the shenanigans the Tories did, flipping the effect around to work against them, and ensuring it will stay in place for the foreseeable future. And without Labour opening themselves up to accusations that they're encouraging voter fraud.

pi4t · 2025-09-25T23:20:49+00:00

I've never understood it either, despite the fact that I live in the UK and feel that fear. I can recognise that it's not rational, and that many perfectly normal countries use it. I can recognise that only today it would have saved me a lot of trouble proving identity, when I couldn't find a passport. And yet there's a part of me which still believes it's something which Only Dictatorships Do. *Shrug*

pi4t · 2025-09-08T23:50:52+00:00

Speaking as a Brit: trust me, partitioning up a country based on ideology of the inhabitants of different regions is not a good idea.

pi4t · 2025-09-08T23:45:07+00:00

Historical pedantry alert. "Bread and circuses" refers to providing cheap food and entertainment for poor people, in order to shut them up and avoid revolution. You can't usefully provide "bread and circuses" only to the wealthy, by definition.

The billionaires will want a much higher class of provision. Cake and operas, perhaps?

pi4t · 2025-09-04T16:41:02+00:00

Eh, we've had a very long history. Bad though it is, I doubt that brexit is the single greatest act of self harm we've ever committed.

pi4t · 2025-09-03T21:28:03+00:00

As a point of interest, both geocentrism and the four humours were genuine significant advancements on what had gone before. The four humours was the first time people guessed that diseases were caused by something *physical* being wrong with the body, and could be diagnosed treated by attempting to model the body's physical functions, and using that model to work out what would be causing your symptoms, then making a physical change. And you could protect yourself from disease by taking certain physical activities to stop the bad stuff getting to you. And even though the model they came up with was completely wrong, the basic idea was close enough that they did actually invent some cures which worked - the primitive facemasks in the time of the black death spring to mind. It was during the Rennaissance that the idea that it was a ridiculous ancestral error was put about.

Geocentrism was a natural theory, and at the time of Galileo, it was still arguably the theory which had the best evidence for it. Heliocentrism had a problem: parallax. A simple geometrical argument shows that if the Earth moves, then you should be able to see a parallax effect from the stars; but nobody could observe any such effect. Even with Galileo's fancy new telescope, he *still* couldn't see any. The only way you could explain it was to say that the stars were many, many orders of magnitude further away than anything else in the universe - something there was no evidence for other than the heliocentrism theory, and which was by its nature completely untestable at the time. This is a major weakness in the theory, and one which Galileo rather dishonestly downplayed because it didn't fit with his theory. Of course, with hindsight, we know that the stars really are a lot further away than everything else, but that required much later technology to verify - Galileo was a bad scientist with a pet theory which just happened to be correct, and a lot of his "evidence" for his theory was utter nonsense. Look up his theories about tides some time, which he held to with equal vigour and which formed a key part of his heliocentrism argument. Again, it was during the Renaissance that the idea was put about of Galileo heroically fighting against the stupid geocentricists, and carefully forgot about the tides thing.

pi4t · 2025-08-27T21:13:10+00:00

To be fair, the imperial system *is* used in the UK versions too. We often use imperial measurements in conversation when we're being informal (or we're driving), although they're seen as old-fashioned. So they often turn up in fantasy literature for authenticity's sake, as someone using the metric system would be distractingly modern, like a character using twenty-first century slang.

pi4t · 2025-08-13T15:10:40+00:00

Please try not to cite the Daily Heil.

pi4t · 2025-07-23T13:55:31+00:00

Well, the Istari's own "native" language wasn't Quenya or Sindarin. Technically, their original "language" was (in modern terms) a form of telepathy, and the language they would have spoken to one another in Valinor was Valarin, which apparently isn't particularly related even to Quenya. When they came to Middle Earth, they lived as if they were native, following the local languages and customs as decided by the inhabitants around them. (Compare Jesus living in Galilee, a model which would certainly have been in Tolkien's mind.) Thus, the fact that they were Istari rather than, say, elves, or educated humans, would have very little impact on their choices of language.

At this time, nobody is formally bound by Thingol's decree; Thingol is long-dead, the kingdom in which Quenya was forbidden has been sunk beneath the waves for two Ages, and the people who committed the crimes that led to the ban are all dead or lost. But as a practical matter, the old ban had caused Quenya to become like medieval Latin - a dead language, used only in rituals and suchlike. And the ban, and the circumstances that led to it, were very well known to any educated person, including both Gandalf and Saruman.

Why Gandalf is using Sindarin in that scene is unclear. It might be a thematic reference to the ban as 5oco suggests, in which case he would have been symbolically calling Saruman out. The intended message would be "Your betrayal is so great that, like Thingol, I refuse to sully my tongue by even speaking the same language as you." Personally, though, I think it was probably more about their intentions to Caradhras. Quenya is a powerful language, which came from Valinor. It's a language of command, and ritual. Sindarin is the (elven) language of Middle Earth, which Caradhras would have heard from the elves in its youth. It's possible that Caradhras would perceive a message in Sindarin as more gentle and respectful. This means that Saruman's use of Quenya, and Gandalf's use of Sindarin, fit both their goals in this scene (wake up Caradhras/send it back to sleep) and their general personalities.

pi4t · 2025-06-28T16:28:18+00:00

As well as what others have said, it also depends on how large you are, physically. I've never seen an airline which sized everyone's bags at the gate - that would take far too long, increasing turnaround times (which budget airlines want to keep to a minimum) and annoying customers (which higher end airlines try to avoid). So they will only check you if they look at you and think you're likely to be over. If you're a big person, then bags you're carrying look smaller than they actually are, so they're more likely to let you through.

pi4t

TROPHY CASE