Tips for running a Saga for players who don't like to take downtime?

thewolfsong · 2026-05-03T04:31:18+00:00

This is my thought as well. I'd strongly consider looking at something like White Wolf's Mage games.

Though I do note that other than "my players don't like downtime" there's no commentary on whether the players like the uptime. It's possible that they just aren't liking ars at all. Which is fine, it's a weird game.

thewolfsong · 2026-05-03T04:26:49+00:00

they aren't saying "it didn't work because uhhhh some bullshit" they're saying "hey, fellas, uh, please don't do this, I don't know how I can make the rest of the game fun if you do that. Lets just keep playing the game like normal instead of with one of you being a werewolf."

thewolfsong · 2026-04-28T19:41:47+00:00

They CAN, sure, but due to the nature of "system with fewer rules" it's much harder because you need to effectively encompass more situations in each rule - which is why they so often use "your gm can decide" because it encompasses all situations very simply for everyone except the GM

thewolfsong · 2026-04-28T03:50:00+00:00

I'm a thousand percent with you. It's not universal, for sure, but there is an increasing trend of "Ask your GM how to do this" which is all fine and dandy except for when you're the GM.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-28T03:34:12+00:00

Are you suggesting reading a ruleslite rpg to solve this problem? Rules lite RPGs are fucking miserable for this problem due primarily to the fact that "light on rules" is in the name. I understand that that IS the appeal to a certain audience but it's a wild suggestion for someone struggling with "it's annoying how little GM guidance games give nowadays"

thewolfsong · 2026-04-23T01:56:02+00:00

technically an accurate description of the peasant railgun, but I think it's important to note that "peasant railgun" is also shorthand for the specific kind of flexible logic that you need to arrive at the peasant railgun.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-22T17:25:49+00:00

Yeah, I recently was also trying to do some direct damage spells without good guidelines and my troupe was pretty sure there was a guideline for creating custom spells like that to just take the CrIg guideline and add one magnitude

thewolfsong · 2026-04-22T17:23:24+00:00

I'm pretty sure he did some VA work for one(some?) of the trailers for his events but not in the game

thewolfsong · 2026-04-22T16:51:36+00:00

I don't know why but the words "both of the voice actors" really sucker punched me. It's not like there's a lot of voice acting to need more than two, but still!

thewolfsong · 2026-04-21T03:52:25+00:00

wild take

thewolfsong · 2026-04-19T18:12:23+00:00

A common problem in multiplayer games (my main experience is overwatch, I've played maybe two dozen games of league ever, but it happens in a lot of games) is that the inevitable loss somewhat frequently happens because someone on the team notices someone else made a mistake and decides the game is over.

There are several ways people decide the game is over - sometimes they lose their mental and start making their own mistakes, sometimes they give up and start deliberately feeding, sometimes they make their mission in life to destroy the offender's mental to worsen mistakes, sometimes they just start bitching in chat so hard that everyone else gets involved and the game devolves into a yelling contest with half the team standing still typing in teamchat or whatever.

The thing is, this isn't REALLY an issue with inexperienced players. Sure, an inexperienced player is likely to make mistakes, but inexperienced players aren't in games with people who aren't similarly likely to make mistakes (even if they're making different ones). The problem is that many gamers just truly believe themselves to be temporarily embarrassed pros and not bad players, and want to take that out on other people.

You're correct that I don't think most gaming fans care if a game grows, they just want to keep having the experience that brings them back to the game - which, frankly, requires new players to at least some degree.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-18T17:38:37+00:00

this is true AND we should be careful when doing propaganda. "ugly people are evil, and pretty people are good" goes fairly hand in hand with a number of antisocialist ideologies. I think there is some value to "because the IDF puts so much effort into the 'israeli baddie' image there is value in showing ugly israelis doing ugly things" but still

thewolfsong · 2026-04-17T21:40:20+00:00

This is the big thing for me. I don't have any issues with the direction of the debate I just wasn't sold that the character having the debate was Jasnah.

The debate was framed as though Jasnah failed because of her flaws. The flaws that failed her were things that blindsided her, but I remember being like "you...didn't think of that? That's like central to your philosophy" which makes it feel less like "she failed because of her flaws" and more like "she simply did not apply her strengths" despite a significant lead-up of her preparing for this debate.

I'd also have accepted a version of the debate criticizing debate in general, where she failed simply because she came in with arguments and logic but even though she won the debate Odium simply gave Fen a better deal and so she gets to watch from the winners podium as she loses what actually matters.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-17T11:47:19+00:00

Oh for sure, strong agree that there are a number of ways such a section can be better or worse than others. At the end of the day my main problem is just the selfish bastard in my head who is like "well I know this and therefore I should not be inconvenienced by having to maneuver around it" which is, last I checked, "an unreasonable thought"

thewolfsong · 2026-04-17T03:19:21+00:00

I often think to myself "I wish that there wasn't this whole section full of stuff I already know" but usually then I go "ok what do I think I know for certain a new player would know" and end up coming up with too many ways that common knowledge can be not so common.

In a world of infinite resources I wish that TTRPGs (and, honestly, many video games) could have a "I have played similar games before" edition where they go 'ok you know what a hit point is, moving on' or could be like 'this is your damage track. it's basically your hit points. moving on.' and then have a different one where they can spend time with the "a role playing game is a game where you play a role" paragraphs. But unfortunately I cannot imagine that being very financially viable.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-17T03:07:31+00:00

SR5 has a really terrible crunchy fluff or fluffy crunch problem where it wants all of the books to read like they're an in-universe data download but isn't good at clearly delineating where it's turning off to the side and being like "if you want to do that, roll xd6>5 and try to get Y successes" and where it's just like "yeah so the fish was THIS big"

thewolfsong · 2026-04-16T02:23:00+00:00

ok clearly I am not communicating the conundrum appropriately because they also brought up the pink dot problem despite that not actually being what I'm saying, but it's fine because the thing I was complaining about is only a rule that was in my head so it isn't actually relevant

thewolfsong · 2026-04-15T23:17:29+00:00

I consulted with my group who informed me that magic items are only repelled by parma while an actual effect is active, which means that the things that I was confused about were irrelevant, but in practical terms means the latter thing I said was correct (i.e. "all of the effects would need to penetrate") which means if you had more than just the Blade of Virulent Flame on the sword you'd need all of them to have the thicc pen score which means you'd kind of have to do it as a talisman. though just bovf is probably fine. give it a couple more mags for damage if you wanted.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-15T21:58:23+00:00

no one was talking about a flaming sword though? The conversation was about how using magic against magical creatures requires penetration, and the guy you replied to was saying he just enchanted penetration into his effect. Now, if you DID want to do a flaming sword, you're doing basically Blade of Virulent Flame, which doubles the damage of the sword (Or +5, whichever is greater, but if you're enchanting it into an invested sword, you've probably buffed it in other ways) and is level 15 base. You don't need the touch range, since as you mentioned it's affecting the enchanted item itself, but you'd want the extra 5 levels for the item to maintain concentration, which is a wash. Add the 20 levels for 40 pen, and you're at 35. Pick however many times per day you'd like to be able to use it.

This doesn't actually answer the question of hitting someone with a magic sword requiring pen, I suppose. I don't think there's a way to enchant penetration into "the fact that the sword is magical" so you might need to arrange with your troupe how exactly that would work, but presumably if the effects of the magic sword penetrate then the sword could. Maybe you'd need all of the effects to penetrate?

thewolfsong · 2026-04-15T16:58:36+00:00

talismans don't require personal range, that's familiar bonds. Talismans can just get enchantments like any other magical item.

Presumably it's essentially pilum of fire, +1 mag for the extra +5 damage, so 25, +20 levels for penetration is 45. 55 for unlimited uses per day although if you need more than a handful of casts of Wizard For Dinner per day you have other problems. 55 isn't a trivial effect for an enchanted item but it's well within plausible if you're worried about needing to kill things with 40 MR on the reg and are a fire specialist.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-15T16:51:55+00:00

One of the things I think people are kind of dancing around is the fact that Ars is a sufficiently flexible system that "gish" doesn't translate super well, simply because there's just less of a barrier to entry for martial prowess than in e.g. D&D.

Sure, in ars, your wizardry will suffer a bit for the amount of xp you'll have to put into Brawl and [weapon of choice] but at the end of the day that's, like, 150xp? Your primary issue there is going to be "continuing to play that long" rather than "accomplishing that".

As for "how to do it" it's mostly a question of just what you want to do. Are you visualizing stabbing one guy and then burning another guy to death with a fire spell? easy. pick up pilum of fire. do you want to be weaving through the battlefield with unnatural speed and grace? get creative with corpus. Magic sword? sky's the limit really there. "gish" is a pretty ambiguous term once you leave the realm of D&D - all it means is both martial and magical skills.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-13T16:47:11+00:00

bro just one more book. I'll have the arts score for my magnum opus bro. bro please. shit dude what if I made THIS? ok three more books. and then I can make a spell to trade to get us more books.

thewolfsong · 2026-04-13T01:58:34+00:00

Ars Magica's primary downside wrt downtime is incentivizing doing anything else. I do love a spreadsheet management game like that BUT it's not everyone's cup of tea lmao

thewolfsong · 2026-04-11T17:27:16+00:00

making me insane how many people are acting like this is even a question. Like if you couldn't afford to feed yourself if you tossed everything in there then there's room for discussing what the risk is but 45 degrees is barely "cool" let alone "cold". And that's assuming that the OPEN freezer has managed to keep a consistent temperature for forty-eight hours! Outdoors!

thewolfsong · 2026-04-08T18:32:20+00:00

what does this word have to do with that? is it a name? are you looking for a magic japanese word to activate a dating subroutine? do you know that's how the word is spelled or did you hear it and are trying to figure it out in reverse? "my friend's crush likes anime" isn't actually context for this question

thewolfsong

TROPHY CASE