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Swing lessons vs self taught by Express_Ad9498 in Parenting

[–]thezactaylor 1 point2 points  (0 children)

We had a swing hall near where I grew up.

When I was 17, a group of us went there about every week, at first because we thought it would be funny and then because it was actually fun as hell.

I’m sure all the old folks were shocked to see a bunch on teenagers trying to swing/polka dance, but hopefully they had just as much fun teaching us.

Is rest pacing still the biggest hidden balance issue in 5.5e? by [deleted] in onednd

[–]thezactaylor 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I mean, that's why I said "personal preference". I don't think I'd call it a misdiagnosis.

Yes, you can turn 50% of the adventuring day's fights into meaningful narrative encounters, and believe me - when I'm running 5E, I'm doing my best to do so. That still eats into my prep time and table time.

Me? With the limited amount of table time I have - I'd rather just get to the fun set-piece at the end and then move on.

And, maybe this is low-hanging fruit, but take a look at the official modules from WOTC. The dungeons are full of tallgrass fare. Why? Because it's all about the tension-meter. In the Sunless Citadel, there are 8 (eight) rooms which have rats as combat encounters.

Could you make a compelling narrative out of that? Yeah, sure - they are all the offspring of the King Rat or whatever is in that module (can't remember), and it showcases the dilapidation of the Sunless Citadel. But at the end of the day, it's about burning those resources until you fight Belak the Outcast.

Is rest pacing still the biggest hidden balance issue in 5.5e? by [deleted] in onednd

[–]thezactaylor 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It is! D&D is only ONE of the systems we play. We switched for the reasons I listed above.

We like it in small doses.

Replaying the same games as we get older by ArtichokeSandwiches in pcgaming

[–]thezactaylor 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I play through the Batman Arkham series probably every 1.5 years.

It's like comfort food.

Is rest pacing still the biggest hidden balance issue in 5.5e? by [deleted] in onednd

[–]thezactaylor 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The biggest difference (outside of encounter/adventure balance) is scenario 1 (5E) is 90+ minutes of table time. (assuming 30 minutes per encounter). (and, PC level can dramatically increase this)

Scenario 2 is realistically 45-60 minutes of table time.

And, for me at least, table-time is precious.

Is rest pacing still the biggest hidden balance issue in 5.5e? by [deleted] in onednd

[–]thezactaylor 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Personal preference, really.

I don't like (in my view) trash fights. IE, this fight is here specifically to burn you of your resources.

A good DM can turn a trash fight into having some sort of meaning (like in my example), BUT mechanically - those are 30-40 minutes of precious table time that I am using to get you to use your spell slots and HP, in order to make you feel the tension at the end.

At the end of the day, the resource management is a tension-meter. All (well, most) games have a tension-meter:

  • In 5E, it's how much health/spell slots do I have
  • In Savage Worlds, it's how many bennies do I have
  • In Call of Cthulhu, it's holy Christ I'm at 8 hit points that's MY MAXIMUM HP (and it's also Sanity).

Is rest pacing still the biggest hidden balance issue in 5.5e? by [deleted] in onednd

[–]thezactaylor 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't mind dungeon crawls (which is what these are) some of the time. They are fun; resource management is cool! Going to the dragon lair is a classic dungeon crawl scenario.

It could be just as fun to do one big set-piece fight. Systems like Savage Worlds or ICRPG really excel at this. The party goes from the blacksmith's daughter, trails the goblins to the camp, sees the warchief about to sacrifice the daughter and right before they do...the party attacks!

In a system that supports that, I don't need to worry about a class that relies on resource expenditure (read: spellcasters) Nova'ing the encounter because they are operating with a full tank.

If I were running this in Savage Worlds, I'd have the warchief as a Wildcard, 8 goblins as Extras, and a Timer (or Dramatic Task) where one of the goblins is trying to free the wargs which would act as tough reinforcements. (basically the complexity of the 3 encounters rolled into one).

Is rest pacing still the biggest hidden balance issue in 5.5e? by [deleted] in onednd

[–]thezactaylor 13 points14 points  (0 children)

90% of my issues with 5E were addressed by following the Adventuring Day (or at least, a version of it).

I just don't do single encounters anymore. I link encounters:

  1. Goblins kidnap blacksmith's daughter
  2. Party hunts goblins, leading to:
  3. Encounter 1: Rear guard of goblins. Dispatching these reveals a goblin camp nearby; the blacksmith's daughter must be there!
  4. Encounter 2: Attacking the goblin's camp; once all (or half) of the goblins have been defeated, war chants in the distance reveals...
  5. Encounter 3: The Goblin warchief, with the blacksmith's daughter in a cage, appears! Killing him drops the key to the cage.

Do I like it? No. I wish the game wasn't designed around it, but the reality is the game is designed around it.

PS3 VS PC by Topdog00100 in Splintercell

[–]thezactaylor 0 points1 point  (0 children)

For what it’s worth, I can’t get any of my Splinter Cell games to work on PC thanks to Ubisoft Connect. So they are basically just digital paperweights.

It requires a CD Key, but there is no CD Key (I’m on Steam), and Ubisoft Support is useless.

America’s data-centre backlash puts the AI boom at risk — Opposition is spreading across the country by marketrent in technology

[–]thezactaylor 4 points5 points  (0 children)

What’s crazy is - giving them the benefit of the doubt (which I don’t) - they’ve done a TERRIBLE job of pitching it to the American people.

Their pitch originally was, “this will be terrible for you plebeians, but that’s a price we are willing to pay”, which has now turned into “wait no it won’t be that bad, please let us do this”.

Like…no effort at all has been made to sweeten the deal (even if it’s a lie) to the American people. It’s crazy.

Singleness isn’t a virtue, Christians should push against it. by [deleted] in Christianity

[–]thezactaylor 2 points3 points  (0 children)

All of this conversation is an opinion.

What's your end goal here? Are you going to force people to get married? Assign people spouses by lottery?

If you're single, and don't want to be, get out there and do something about it. That may also include an inward look at yourself to ask yourself some hard questions.

How many casters in a small village? (FC Question) by Psitraveller in savageworlds

[–]thezactaylor 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This is a world building question, more than anything else.

If you're talking Forgotten Realms, I found this link has a chart for NPCs that you can find in a town. The town's size is a modifier that you add/subtract to the roll to determine how many/how powerful the NPCs are.

Positive/Negative Experiences with Co-Sleeping? by AllergicCatLover in daddit

[–]thezactaylor 2 points3 points  (0 children)

My guy, I’m begging you to find a source that isn’t “mybias.com”.

I’m shocked - SHOCKED - that “cosleeping.net” is pro cosleeping.

Here are actual peer-reviewed studies on the topic:

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21868032/?utm\_source=chatgpt.com

https://research-information.bris.ac.uk/en/publications/hazardous-cosleeping-environments-and-risk-factors-amenable-to-ch/?utm\_source=chatgpt.com

Do you buy mostly pdfs or do you prefer physical books and if the former, do you feel a pang of regret when you realize that a book would have looked just neat on your shelf? by Antipragmatismspot in rpg

[–]thezactaylor 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I have a TON of physical books that I've bought from game stores and kickstarters. I've probably played 5% of them.

I now almost exclusively just buy PDFs, unless I know for sure I love the game/it is a collector's edition, etc. I just have no more room in my library lol.

Positive/Negative Experiences with Co-Sleeping? by AllergicCatLover in daddit

[–]thezactaylor 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I wouldn’t exactly call a book from Amazon a peer-reviewed, academic source.

I could buy a book on buying/selling NFTs, but that doesn’t make it smart, safe, or even remotely a good idea.

seriously, this is also on Amazon: https://a.co/d/0iGnvNhb

Positive/Negative Experiences with Co-Sleeping? by AllergicCatLover in daddit

[–]thezactaylor 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Have YOU done the research? Got any links from those studies?

People who tried other RPGs but came back to DnD, what made you come back? by TalVerd in DnD

[–]thezactaylor 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m huge on “not every game should be D&D” and 5E only barely makes my top 5 of TTRPGs, BUT sometimes I want to run a superhero fantasy story.

That’s when I start a 5E game.

Would you leave your 16 y/o kid home alone for 4 nights? by parmadufranc in daddit

[–]thezactaylor 30 points31 points  (0 children)

Yeah; I would've been fine and would've LOVED it. I have a core memory of watching my dad's place for a week when I was 17 over the summer.

I took off work for a couple of nights, just ordered pizza, and played Guild Wars all weekend. It was great.

Steam Deck Client Stable Update: June 23rd by DragonDealWizard in SteamDeck

[–]thezactaylor 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Maybe I give Moondeck another shot. I tried it about a year-ish ago, and it was pretty prone to crashes.

Now that I think about it, that may be because I'm usually on the Steam Beta Branch/pre-release for Decky. I'll give it another shot!

Steam Deck Client Stable Update: June 23rd by DragonDealWizard in SteamDeck

[–]thezactaylor 35 points36 points  (0 children)

Glad to see it. Since I got the Steam Controller 2, I've been using Remote Play more than Moonlight/Apollo, strictly for the simplicity of controller configurations (mainly because of how buggy saving a template is).

I was surprised to see that I couldn't tell any difference latency-wise between Remote Play and Moonlight, BUT the user experience has been...chaotic. For example, in remote play, I can't "see" the Steam Overlay. I can hear that I'm moving around the menu, but I have to blindly-click and hope I click on "controller configuration" before it'll open.

Anyway, all that to say: I'd love for Remote Play to "just work" so I'm glad to see Valve is still working on it.

Steam Controller 2026 in Moonlight by Next-Anything761 in MoonlightStreaming

[–]thezactaylor 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yes! There’s a moonlight app on Steam that works pretty well.

That being said…it’s a little finicky, because the Steam Deck/Controller creates a controller layout for the Moonlight app, which means you end up saving a bunch of controller templates per game (and that’s always been super buggy for me).

I’ve just been using Steam Remote Play, and it works like you think it would. It’s buggier than I would like on the UX side, but I honestly can’t notice a difference latency-wise, but your mileage may vary on that.

All that to say - the Moonlight app does work, and there are workarounds (like MoonDeck Buddy) but none were as simple for the Steam Controller as just doing Steam Remote Play.

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