jpk
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Post by jpk on Dec 6, 2015 0:44:28 GMT -8
I know not everyone gets all that deep into the shugenja rules, but there are huge differences there. They don't look that big in passing, but important elements like "keeping the spell slot with enough raises" changed entirely.
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jpk
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Post by jpk on Oct 12, 2014 7:58:55 GMT -8
I actually get pretty annoyed as a player when a 46 roll gets a better result than a 16 roll for a skill check. Raises are supposed to be called beforehand. If you don't actually use those rules, then a few things start to break down around the edges. The value of your Void gets less as it no longer limits the number of raises you can all. Your skill becomes less important in the face of your luck with dice. Your judgement as a player and character as to what you can accomplish and what failure you're willing to risk gets set aside. And the raise mechanic starts to bifurcate, with it behaving differently (usually) for combat effects versus noncombat effects.
But I'm stuffy like that.
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jpk
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Post by jpk on Feb 13, 2014 0:54:34 GMT -8
As far as the Gateway Arch in St. Louis goes, if it were just the top half, it wouldn't make a circle or a sphere. The "visible" part is a modified inverted catenary curve, where a pure catenary curve is what you'd get if you hung a chain between two anchor points.
An ellipse is what you get when you identify all the points whose distance from two fixed points is constant when added together (or if you take a string, tie its ends to two nails, and use it to trace a shape).
I'll now let us all get back to stuff you're way more likely to care about. ;-)
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jpk
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SW
Nov 20, 2013 14:19:28 GMT -8
Post by jpk on Nov 20, 2013 14:19:28 GMT -8
If you want to write your own campaign, I'd probably go with Companions over settings. If you want to pick something up and run with it, I'd probably go with settings over Companions.
As for what Companion to get, I'd say that depends on what you want to do and how you want to approach it. The Horror Companion is a pretty good toolset for making anything dark or for settings where the players are usually outclassed by the opposition.
The Super Powers Companion is probably the single most useful for folks with an open mind who are interested in making any high-powered setting of their own. Pretty much any time your players are expected to be able to do great things at will, that's where you want the Super Powers Companion, and it includes enough tweak options to set that power level as you like. Super heroes? Of course. Wuxia? The differences are often cosmetic, so, yes. Urban fantasy a la Dresden or so? Works out great to keep your PC wizards, golems, werewolves, and what-have-yous on a pretty even keel (including the "normal" when you realize just how super a lot of the normals in those stories are).
Depending on what you want out of the Fantasy Companion and what core rulebook you've got, that might not be your go-to buy. The expanded spells and race creation guidelines were a large part of what made the FC a go-to book for folks, but nearly all of that is in the Deluxe editions now.
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jpk
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Post by jpk on Oct 15, 2013 19:21:18 GMT -8
Well, what do the aliens need to be able to do? I think we'd really need a little more context to give you some aliens that would work.
Unless, of course, you just want some guys with nosepieces, a la Star Trek. In that case, they're just normal people with nosepieces.
If you want them to have a little mechanical variety but don't really care what it is, use the standard races (or monsters) out of the book and put them in whole-body-pieces so they look different.
Or just pick an adjective for temperament, a defining physical feature, and one cool combat maneuver or piece of equipment. Bammo. You're done.
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jpk
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Post by jpk on Oct 15, 2013 14:04:49 GMT -8
blueprint style would be awesome!! Not only would it inform combat, but it would be a fantastic prop to get hold of as part of the pre-run legwork. Not to be a big ol' shill or anything, but have you looked at Fabled Environments' materials? They make maps, mostly for modern building, mostly in blueprint style (since they have those architectural day jobs and all).
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jpk
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Posts: 58
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Post by jpk on Oct 15, 2013 13:56:49 GMT -8
I'll be inrlterested to see if publishers don't start laying out books with the pdf in mind. You would think they would be doing this already..... I think it depends on where your money is and what your audience wants. I mostly laid out books whose main sales were physical copy. For books that were supplemental and PDF-only, people would howl like stuck pigs if the layout were different than the core book. Those two things tended to drive many of my layout decisions. For companies whose main sales are PDF, I think you are starting to see more of a shift to reader-friendly layouts. The rise of the single column, especially in roughly-digest-sized books, is significant and increasing. Most of us (and here I become the totally unelected spokesperson for a whole group that do not know I'm speaking for them, quite likely against their collective will) who come from a print background have some trouble overcoming those instincts. Learning what is essentially a new way of looking at books and your layout flow is not a quick, easy, or comfortably task. All of that, of course, is just my two cents. I'd give you my two kruppleniks, but I believe JiB used them all up.
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jpk
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 58
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Post by jpk on Oct 15, 2013 11:54:22 GMT -8
This does me no good for my long drive tomorrow afternoon (Eastern). You have failed me for the last time!
And by "last," I mean "most recent." Dang.
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jpk
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 58
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Post by jpk on Oct 12, 2013 15:00:47 GMT -8
At a first blush, I think what you've effectively done is returned to a ten-step system but introduced a bell curve to the results. Is that at all what you intended to do?
And to clarify, with your first d20 and d100 plans, every chance had an equal chance of being rolled: you were as likely to get maximum or minimum results. With multiplying the two dice, your chances of getting the maximum or minimum result drop dramatically (only a 1% chance of either) while your chances of getting something in the middle band shoot upwards (much like you see when adding dice, like Hero's 3d6).
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jpk
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Post by jpk on Oct 12, 2013 14:51:20 GMT -8
Looks interesting enough for me to give it a shot, too. I'm willing to lose my initial cash outlay of absolutely no Euros (even if I'm not totally sure how that translates to US Dollars...).
Mook, I used to work with some teams in the UK and some in Thailand. We finally decided nobody would check the spelling of anything until we were done and localizing. Were you aware their billions are bigger than ours?
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jpk
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 58
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Post by jpk on Sept 12, 2013 12:38:07 GMT -8
Well, if you're trying to write a general "find the probably of hitting target number TN with die type DT and Wild Die of type WD" sort of thing, you'd just need to do this:
1-((1-(Chance of hitting TN with DT))*(1-(Chance of hitting TN with WD)))
Use the formula above with whatever your particular script supplies for getting the quotient and the remainder. Also note that the chance referred to above is a 0-1 probability. If you want to work in percentages, you'd have to change the ones to one hundreds and alter the formula to generate percentages (or multiply the final answer of the probability version by 100).
But any way you slice it, it's simply true that the chance of hitting a target number of a specific die type (from 6-12) is about 1% higher with a die type one lower (from 4-10). It's a one-spot sort of thing and hasn't really impacted play that I've seen (barring obsessive math folks like, well, possibly me).
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jpk
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Post by jpk on Sept 8, 2013 7:22:05 GMT -8
As has been mentioned, there's a lot of space in a class for variation. One of our best campaigns for 3.5 was one we came to call Three Rogues and a Necromancer. That's what the party was, but all three rogues were entirely different. I was a diplomacy and social guy, one was a master burglar, and the third was traps and tricks sort of expert (who like to accidentally shoot himself with his apparently loaded "all ones" dice).
If it worries you that much, though, just observe the first game and make something to fit. Or "finish up" while they're going through the first half of the game and be ready to go after the ubiquitous pizza break.
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jpk
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Posts: 58
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Post by jpk on Sept 7, 2013 12:03:01 GMT -8
That looks pretty darned sweet!
For some extra utility, I might suggest that you go with an art space that is the same area as the stat space, especially if you go with any of the "standard" sizes for each half like 2.5" x 3.5" (poker-size), 4" x 6", or 5" x 7".
If you print them as a single spread, you can use them as GM references with all information facing the GM. If you fold one in half like that, you can then slide it into a card protector, like the rigid protectors they make for collectible cards, postcards, and pictures, and use the picture side to show to players, have the stat side for the GM, and all of which you can write on with a dry-erase marker.
I just tried something similar with character sheets and it worked out wonderfully at a con game.
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jpk
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Posts: 58
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Post by jpk on Sept 7, 2013 11:56:58 GMT -8
For what it's worth, the general formula for hitting a Target Number of TN with a Die Type of DT is: DT - remainder((TN-1)/DT) DT^(quotient((TN-1)/DT)+1) So, for example, if you're looking for a TN 6 on a DT d6, the formula would give you 6 - remainder((6-1)/6) 6^(quotient((6-1)/6)+1) 6 - remainder(5/6) 6^(quotient(5/6)+1) 6 - 5 6^(0+1) 1 6^(1) 1 6 Now, for that example, the math seems to be an extreme waste of time to get to "one out of six, you pinhead." However, if you want to know what the likelihood of actually hitting a target number (TN) of 55 on a die type (DT) of d4 is, you get: 4 - remainder((55-1)/4) 4^(quotient((55-1)/4)+1) 4 - remainder(54/4) 4^(quotient(54/4)+1) 4 - 2 4^(13+1) 2 4^(14) 2 268,435,456 1 134,217,728 If you're sort of probability minded, you might already realize that only gets you the one die. To find you chance of success with either of two dice, you'd need to find your chance of failure with both and subtract that from 1 (for fractional folks) or 100 (for percent people). For instance, your chance of failing a TN 4 on a d6 (the Wild Die) is 1/2. Your chance of failing a TN 4 on a d4 is 3/4. Your chance of failing on both dice at the same time is 1/2 times 3/4, for 3/8. So, your chance of success on a d4 with a d6 Wild Die is 1-(3/8), which is 5/8. So, there you go. Math out! ;-)
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jpk
Apprentice Douchebag
Posts: 58
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Post by jpk on Aug 2, 2013 19:35:33 GMT -8
So, have you read American Gods?
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