Posts made by Pyrephox

@surreality Please remove this person from your life. Seconding what people have said up above - they're not your friend. Friends sometimes go through rough patches, or they say stupid shit, but if it's been relentless and constant like this? It's not a rough patch. It's not a slip of stupid shit. It's deliberate and it will never truly stop as long as they remain in your life.

Also, I don't think anyone who has done the work you've done can ever be considered "not creative". Juries liked your work. People like your work enough to /pay actual money for it/. That's a pretty compelling evidence that it speaks to people who aren't abusive assholes. And I really, truly hope that you come to recognize and respect your work again!

@seamus said in Experienced Tiers or How much is too much?:

I think this is probably the best place for this.

What is the general thoughts of allowing every player a PC with 750 xp right out of the gate?

Well - one, it really depends on the system you're using on how much that actually is, and what power of characters it produces.

But let's say that we're talking having high-powered characters right out of the gate. That's fine, IF the game is set up to have events and plots that are commiserate with the capabilities of the characters. My experience is the higher powered the PCs are, the fewer GMs are able to design and run plots - especially if power translates into 'ability to change the environment or rules of the universe'. A high powered game, particularly if it's a high powered fantasy or high SF game, is going to be doing /seriously freaky stuff/ to the local social, political, physical, and occult environment. If your GMs can't handle that, or you don't /want/ to handle that, then there's really no reason to have high-powered characters as your default. They're going to get bored and start going after the only worthy challenges - each other.

Another thing that should be mentioned - not having the AP to share a @clue never means that you can't share the /information/. All it means is that you can't share the proof at that moment - a scribe hasn't finished copying the journals, you're not in the right place to break out that old book or scrap of artifact, whatever. But that doesn't mean you have to put off someone who you want to know something - just tell them the information, and then share the @clue when you have time. Not having AP isn't ever really a good excuse for not telling something what they may need to know.

But we do sometimes need to thoughtfully consider what other people actually need to know, and it's not always "clue hording" to not widely share around clues that could have consequences. ICly, we've already seen a lot of people - mostly NPCs but some PCs - get killed or worse because PCs felt the need to blab about everything they know in public.

Yeah. I don't /hate/ theories, but I have very little interest in writing them, and only slightly more interest in reading them. I also sort of worry about tying them to orgs, because at least in the main Faith branch (I know that some of the branch orgs are having...issues with being clue dump sites), I've tried to get people to keep it to historical 'Church facts' and lore about prayers, traditions, and customs that pretty much everyone as member of the Church should know, with very few truly 'secret' sort of clues. Although I probably should go through and see if I can prune it, because I haven't looked in a while. But those sorts of things don't really lend themselves well to theories, although I could make some generic 'practices of the Church' and 'History of the Church' ones.

Please note that I am in no way on the "rape factory" train, nor do I think it's a logical or inevitable conclusion. And I certainly wouldn't want it to be part of the game!

All I was doing is riffing on some of the setting ideas - not saying it /should/ be this way, or it /must/ be this way. Having played on several @Cobaltasaurus games, I trust her to make a setting that is fun and enjoyable. I just like worldbuilding.

@carex said in Development Thread: Sacred Seed:

@pyrephox

You could also create a secondary class of nobility by calling the newly seeded "Blessed" and make them part of a church structure. You go from commoner to priest to noble if you are lucky.

Yeah. Or a bureaucracy of some sort. Like, newly Seeded go into a civil service sort of arrangement, freeing up the blooded nobles for more interesting tasks, and if you do your work well and learn to play the game, your family might eventually rise out of civil service to 'real' nobility. Perhaps through a system of finding someone to patron your rise.

@carex said in Development Thread: Sacred Seed:

Economically and socially it's really, really, a bad idea to leave outcast nobles alive. If you prune someone you need to remove all ties from them. Have a ritual of forgetting that erases them from all records and burns their belongings.

They need to not only be treated as if they are dead but as if they had never existed in the first place. If you can get away with it just kill them.

If you leave even a hint of noble ties then they have kids those kids might form a rebellion later. You can't have kids popping up taking portions of wealth or land unexpectedly because you let some pruned seedling walk away with an untapped legacy. It's horrible for the stability of the nation.

If you want to incorporate people moving from being a commoner to a noble then have multiple tiers of nobility. A titled and untitled nobility perhaps.

One tier that can inherit land and one that can only be awarded land by a higher noble. Once someone is awarded land they get a title and their offspring can then inherit land.

You don't want just any old commoner who wins the genetic lottery gaining political power. You need a system of gate-keeping.

On the other hand, it sounds like the mage gifts are only kept alive through fairly rigorous breeding and 'fresh' Seeded are often more powerful than those in the noble families. While that's a political threat, it's also a heck of an opportunity to bolster your family's bloodlines. Which might also provide a rationale for not killing Weeded nobles - they're still from a magic rich bloodline, and if they go out and breed with commoners, it might still raise the chance of throwing a fluke down the line that the family can then claim and breed back into the line.

Although the point about needing to control those common-born Seeded is important. If it weren't a persistent MU* setting, I would suggest that being married into a noble family would be required for a common-born Seeded to be fully acknowledged. But with PCs, that's a recipe for trouble, so I'd simply suggest, instead, that common-born Seeded get enthusiastically courted, with an eye to getting them to sign a contract (or whatever the equivalent is) that dedicates their service to a noble house, and that many of these get married off to one of the noble lines, as well, in hopes that their children will inherent the power.

@three-eyed-crow I definitely think one thing games should think about more is 'how far outside of our intended PCs are we going to support', and what to do if someone wants to play outside of that. I don't mean a "bad" concept, but just...like, a regular, ordinary baker in a high fantasy court intrigue setting. Are you going to allow that character? If you do, are you going to devote time from high fantasy court intrigue plots to support that character's quest for the perfect cookies?

I don't think there's a right answer to either of those questions - it really depends on the pace of the game, and the amount of load staff feels like taking on - but they should be asked, and lines drawn where necessary.

Yeah. There's a lot of potential in this setting, whether you want to go PvE or open things up for more PvP - rebel cells, charismatic pretenders, rogue Seeded trying to establish their own Court.

Are you thinking there might be other nations out there? Even a fairly distant one with a regular trade relationship (or that pirates the home nation's waters) could add some depth to the world, as well as another antagonist or ally for players to court.

@cobaltasaurus And how you ICly name this whole process could tell people a lot about the culture and its values. If it's something fairly straightforward and blunt (like Ritual of Pruning or Ritual of Attainder) then it suggests that the nobility is unflinching regarding the costs of their lifestyle, and also suggests a certain bluntness in culture. On the other hand, if you go with something obscure, flowery, and with an air of secrecy and repression about it - like, The Ritual of Autumn's First Wind - that only makes any sense if you paw through some allegory, then it suggests a culture who would rather mask terrible things in pretty words and pageantry, which also can have knock on effects for the rest of the society (like, maybe after the Ritual, the family instead of acknowledging that the Weed has been disowned, carries out a funeral and officially, they've "died" and are literally never acknowledged by any member of the family as alive ever again).

@cobaltasaurus said in Development Thread: Elements: Courts of the Sacred Seed:

On the day that you should be choosing a Court to join (if say your magic is different than your parents...) you are instead put through a public the Ritual of Attainder (maybe rename this Ritual of Clipping ??).

Pruning. "Did you hear? Lady Iris' youngest is probably going to be Pruned at the end of the year. Seventeen and not a hint of power." "Such a shame, really. But the Gardens of the Courts must be tended."

Or, worse: /Weeded/. With an unseeded from noble origins referred to as a Weed, if you want to really convey that disdain.

@coin said in Development Thread: Elements: Courts of the Sacred Seed:

@pyrephox said in Development Thread: Elements: Courts of the Sacred Seed:

Okay, the Chef element really intrigues me, because I think it could add a real meaty component, especially for Seedless. Basically, stealing from several niche anime:

Ingredient Hunters. Maybe there are rare, dangerous ingredients out there which have boosting/altering effects on how the Sacred Fruit is metabolized in a Seeded's body - like, Fruit broth made with the heart of a newborn firedrake allows fire Seeded to cast at a reduced mana cost until it's been digested (say, 24-48 hours), and if you can add some of the milk from a wild windchaser, a flying mammal found only at the tops of the highest canopies to make that into a rich soup, you get reduced mana costs AND your flames are resistant to wind magic. Or something like that.

Someone has to gather these ingredients, and the nobles sure aren't going to do it (note: you'll have to /enforce/ this with theme and mechanics, or else the nobles are gonna want to be mages AND chefs AND ingredient hunters), so it falls to those scrappy, hungry, fearless sorts who go out into the godawful wilderness, risk getting horribly murdered, and drag back delicacies for the meals of the nobles, selling them for enough to make comfortable livings - as long as they don't get injured or killed in the process.

If you go off of it that way, then you can have three main entry points for 'roles in the game': Nobility, with a focus on magical adventure and intrigue and politics. Chefs, with a focus on intrigue (you can't tell me that rivals don't want to poison each other's food, or sub out high quality for fake Fruit to cripple each other), and crafting (I suggest a robust 'recipe' system that allows Chefs to really get creative with food and that rewards investment in multiple skills - like, maybe instead of just a 'cooking' skill, have several skills and/or special techniques that Chefs can purchase). And Ingredient Hunters, with a focus on wilderness adventure, combat, and weird skills like being able to use /everything/ from a beast - these guys, ideally, would be a little like Monster Hunters from the games, and swagger into town wearing bizarre equipment created from skins, horns, and teeth of their kills, dragging the broken down corpses of nightmare beasts for the market. More, two of those paths would greatly favor Seedless characters over Seeded, which should balance out the inherent I HAVE MAGIC awesomeness of being Seeded.

Especially if you're strict about NOT letting the Seeded go in and take over the Chef academies, or become the best Ingredient Hunters. Maybe those low status Seeded can dabble in one or both of those careers, but it should cost them.

Maybe being Seeded means you give off certain types of pheromones/whatever that wildlife are either really reticent to get close to (making it hard to hunt certain things) or predators REALLY wanna eat (making it very, very dangerous--like, 99% mortality rate for Seeded to go out Ingredient Hunting).

The only downside there is that the burden is then on staff to a) make sure that it is as dangerous as the fluff says it is, and b) put up with the hissyfits of players who sent their Seeded prince or princess out in the wilderness and got their throat torn out, and are completely surprised and appalled that this happened.

Okay, the Chef element really intrigues me, because I think it could add a real meaty component, especially for Seedless. Basically, stealing from several niche anime:

Ingredient Hunters. Maybe there are rare, dangerous ingredients out there which have boosting/altering effects on how the Sacred Fruit is metabolized in a Seeded's body - like, Fruit broth made with the heart of a newborn firedrake allows fire Seeded to cast at a reduced mana cost until it's been digested (say, 24-48 hours), and if you can add some of the milk from a wild windchaser, a flying mammal found only at the tops of the highest canopies to make that into a rich soup, you get reduced mana costs AND your flames are resistant to wind magic. Or something like that.

Someone has to gather these ingredients, and the nobles sure aren't going to do it (note: you'll have to /enforce/ this with theme and mechanics, or else the nobles are gonna want to be mages AND chefs AND ingredient hunters), so it falls to those scrappy, hungry, fearless sorts who go out into the godawful wilderness, risk getting horribly murdered, and drag back delicacies for the meals of the nobles, selling them for enough to make comfortable livings - as long as they don't get injured or killed in the process.

If you go off of it that way, then you can have three main entry points for 'roles in the game': Nobility, with a focus on magical adventure and intrigue and politics. Chefs, with a focus on intrigue (you can't tell me that rivals don't want to poison each other's food, or sub out high quality for fake Fruit to cripple each other), and crafting (I suggest a robust 'recipe' system that allows Chefs to really get creative with food and that rewards investment in multiple skills - like, maybe instead of just a 'cooking' skill, have several skills and/or special techniques that Chefs can purchase). And Ingredient Hunters, with a focus on wilderness adventure, combat, and weird skills like being able to use /everything/ from a beast - these guys, ideally, would be a little like Monster Hunters from the games, and swagger into town wearing bizarre equipment created from skins, horns, and teeth of their kills, dragging the broken down corpses of nightmare beasts for the market. More, two of those paths would greatly favor Seedless characters over Seeded, which should balance out the inherent I HAVE MAGIC awesomeness of being Seeded.

Especially if you're strict about NOT letting the Seeded go in and take over the Chef academies, or become the best Ingredient Hunters. Maybe those low status Seeded can dabble in one or both of those careers, but it should cost them.

Two or three. Two, because you've already fleshed it out a bit, and what's there sounds /awesome/. I love magic, intrigue, and all that fun stuff. The prospect of essentially 'stealing' a Seeding offers a really cool source of tension and striving, and the Dark Seeders make for interesting bad guys who could easily hide in plain sight. Good, simple but eminently playable setup.

Three, provided it turned into a colonization game. I've /always/ wanted to play a really good SF colonizing-a-hostile/strange-planet game, and that sounds like it could fit the bill. Without it being fleshed out a bit more, it's hard to say which my vote would go to definitively, but either of those two would be a hell of a lot of fun, I'm sure.

Thank you all! That helps a lot.

@mietze said in Let's talk about TS.:

I dunno. But it seems to me the biggest problem people are always complaining about their RP partners to their other ones. It's pretty fun when the "spokes" of the wheel finally talk and realize what a shit the "hub" is being. I've made some of the best mush friends that way.

It usually seems to be a way of manipulating play partners to a) stay away from each other, and b) be flattered by the praise (and therefore spend more of their RP time with the manipulator).

@kay said in Let's talk about TS.:

@ganymede said in Let's talk about TS.:

@theonceler

Jake the One-Eyed Trouser Snake.
The Flesh Spear of Destiny.
Russell the Milk-Spitting Muscle.
Misplaced Baby Fist.
Squirtle.

I can keep going, I guess.

I feel you should! Extra points if it could also be the name for a D&D weapon or artifact.

Rod of Monstrous Size?

@sunny Sometimes these conversations about limits /do/ happen outside the bounds of sexytimes, though. Like, if I run a horror scenario, I might ask players if they have any hard limits on content - whether it's 'no dead babies or children' or 'no spiders' or 'no eye stuff'. It's not meant to pry about their personal feelings about these things, but just to make sure an enjoyable scene doesn't hit something that instantly makes it not fun for the players involved.

@lisse24 said in Character 'types':

@three-eyed-crow I once had someone do this to me and their tragic back story included all sorts of sexual torture, which they described, in detail. I was like nope. Nopenopenope. Done with that character.

This is a note to everyone, ever: Please don't do this. Do not spring surprise sexual trauma on people. Not in the moment, and not in the backstory, especially surprise sexual torture. Just...don't. There is no way to make me backpedal faster from wanting to play with your character. And I'm not even particularly squicked by sexual trauma or sexual torture - I just don't really want to deal with it from (often) pretty much strangers IC.

@ganymede Yeah. Lack of stealth, lack of knowledge related skills (Fashion, Romance, and High Finance, yes! But no, say, Underworld, or 'Knowledge of this City', or History, or Politics, or...), and lack of a framework for how to set up social/intellectual challenges in a satisfying way is making the idea of running things - or figuring out how to get my character involved without spending way more time reading up on things than I'd hoped - a bit daunting.