Rob

This may be my last DiD post. Kinda hoping it is.

Mark, one of the great things about DiD was the table talk page. I think the forums could use an 'off-topic' section where we could continue our usual bullshit. Unless you're thinking that the forums should be impersonal and pdf-only. But I think adding an off-topic section would be nice. Certainly, I don't have much to say on the forums right now as it is.

You should announce on the forums that the pdfs are ready. I'll do the same in the Narb section.

...

Oh, and, bye everyone. It's been a ton of fun. Hope to see you on the other site, which is:

http://yeoldegamingcompanye.com/

I suppose there I'm not going to be 'Rob' anymore, but 'Greg Vrill'.

Mark

The beta version is up, chummers.

I'll give it today, and then open the gates tonight.

Any help on board moderation is greatly appreciated.

Thanks for all the help so far.

Rob

New map, here and on the gmail account. Let me know if you see anything bad.

More rivers named; more cities near forests; two new cities; minor corrections.

Almost there.

v7.1 is on the gmail.

Except for some page numbers and an example character the beta version is almost ready for posting.

Last call.

RIP DID

Yeah, I think that works.

There is a 'staff' forum that only we should be able to see. We can move the chat to there. I made Moth a GM too.

Rob

How about, after we put the system on the site, we move all this discussion to the forums?

That'll effectively kill off DiD I guess. Somehow fitting.

Mark

Check out the site. Not all the functionality is there yet, however.

http://yeoldegamingcompanye.com/

Mark

Just did the column thing. Some of it's a bit weird. Table bleeds over pages and such. It will need tweaking, but it's not worth doing until we get illustrations in it.

I had to change some tables. Lots of small full-width tables doesn't work at all. All the columns in between look like shit. It's much better to have half-width tables if there are a lot of them in the same section. At first the character creation section was a mess. -I'm still not through with it.

Now I know why people do columns: We lost 90 pages. It's crazy. We are now at 355. It was 445 just before I did it. That's 25%. Crazy.

Anyway, I am still formatting. I'll put what I have on the gmail account before I sleep.

EDIT: Ok, it's going up. This still isn't the final font. Also, I think the section headings need to be improved. And, there's plenty of weird layout quirks. But, it's a start. At any rate, it's a good thing I started doing the columns now.

EDIT-EDIT: Fixed some more things over the morning coffee. It's a bit less jacked-up. I replaced last night's version 7.0 on the gmail account.

BTW, grayfaced is a global moderator. -Thanks.

Rob

Thanks Paul, most of your suggestions were sent to the artist. A few new cities have been added, and some- but not all- of the rivers named. I need to revise the Narbohring guide to match the new geography, and I'll add a note to the Surveyors Guild description that not all of Narbohring has been settled. Not all rivers and other stuff named for space regions- this includes other villages that exist but aren't on the map. Interesting ones I try to mention in the appropriate major geographical region/nearest major city.

Check out how Bourgansbaine is a little black tower, and Stalograhd is a fucking fist. I love the change to Nycene's shape, etc etc.

Agree with all of the Mark/Paul stuff below.

Still no edits to Narbohring. I'm gonna wait til the map is done and then revise it extensively, hopefully over the weekend. New map version should be posted tomorrow if you guys have anything further to add.

Mark

Thanks, Paul. I agree with, and changed most. Here's some commentary, however:

Dwarves have perfect direction sense, as they are able to detect the planet’s magnetic field. Really? Magnetic Field? Drop the Direction Sense, unless you can come up with a better reason. Dude, birds do it. Dwarves can too. Here, your silly is my cool.

Perhaps Ambidextrousness Discipline should be Ambidexterity? It does seem odd that the big down side of a low Agility is off hand penalties that can be negated with a single discipline. Ambidextrousnessessnous. Yeah, your right. Ambidexterity it is. I agree. It is odd, but so are a few other disciplines if you think on them too long.

Also the majority of skills give a bonus the 12th stat level, why not make them all scale the same. I guess Endurance is the only one that doesn't. I'll do it (12 = +1hp), but now folks are losing their auto 1 hp per level after 13th.

The resistance modifiers are basically scaled so you will end up with either no bonus, or a minus 1 or plus one. If that is how it is just drop the issue because nobody will have a combined score like you are showing. It is easier to increase attributes now, but I'll tighten the range up a bit to make +/-2, etc more relevant. Agreed, most folk were just between +/- 1.

Perhaps you could have presence affect the mental and have endurance do the physical, straight up. Or just have Presence affect both, it would give non priest types a reason to like presence, and in a backwards sort of way it brings luck as an element into the game nicely. It also eliminate almost a page of rules. Sorry, I really like all the attributes playing into it. -It penalizes the int 5, str 16 folk, as well.

You still need parenthesis on the discipline cost list. Is it 20 for weapon mastery 2 or is it 12? Likewise for all skills with this type of listing. I really did think that Hermetic circles cost 13 x circle, which was well stupid of me, but it was also bad formating. Sorry, it's the physicist in me. Order of operations my man. -I'll add parentheses.

On page 15 you should just make it clear on backstab that the target has their agilty halved for the first round of attacks instead of the confusing "first attack(s)" Fixed.

blindfighting costs too much. Costs 5 now.

Does evasion preclude the use of a potion, it seems to imply that it does.... "must forgo all other actions" No food or drink. It says so in there.

Why can't people cast spells with a shield, but they can if they have a staff, or 2 shortswords? Finally removed all traces of that nonsense. Thanks.

Still, why the fuck would anyone wear scalemail? or Ring? Armor should give some bonus to dodge, if you don't believe me get in some more fights wearing armor, and without it. Hey, scalemail is now cheaper!!! Dodge means not getting hit. Not touched. Armor absorbs energy. Wearing armor is more cumbersome than being naked. It reduces your birthday suit dodginess. -That's why it's that way.

As an aside, it freaking drives me nuts that a negative Impedance is worse, but Matt thought it made more sense, and all negative is bad, positive good, etc. Still, being a physicist, a negative impedance means less impedance. So, it's a negative impedance score. I tried to think of better names, but I can't. it still makes me cringe a bit.

Spell casting should be announced at the beginning of the round. Not on the acting initiative. People should announce what they rolled and what they are trying to cast. If they want to change spells they should have a penalty to their initiative. I think this is complicated. I also don't think of rounds so discretely. They are a necessary evil, but beginning and end are kind of arbitrary to me. I thought of a roundless system, (action points, rates, etc.) but that was crazy complicated. Think of it this way; a character's initiative is the top of their personal round. Spell casting still takes time, and can be interrupted.

Or this way: A 1st circle spell going off at init 2 or a 1st circle going off at init 10. Why should one have so many actions take place before the other? -I actually was doing what you suggested early on, but I think 'the beginning of the round' becomes an arbitrary check point for casters.

whoa, if I attack a 15th level fighter who is asleep as an assassin the worst the outcome will be is that the character in question that I attack will wake up and have 1 hp. sweet. page 37. Why does it matter if it's a blunt weapon when I bash some guys skull in who is asleep? I don't think a mace or a dagger would make that much difference to a sleeping guy......really. Fixed this. It's edged weapon: death or 1/2 hp. Blunt weapon: 0 hp or 1/2 hp. I think a mace or dagger makes some difference. Nothing tops the throat slit. But, I simplified it.

How many attacks does the Assassin get to take on Randolph? One on hand, and one off, or a full round of attacks? Page 37. Fixed it. He gets his normal round of attacks.

Thats all I can read right now.

Thanks. It's very much appreciated. These are all good points.

BTW, I think it's Heuristician. -That's what I'm calling you, if it's cool.

sorry it's so late in the game

In addition to their keen sight, dwarves have perfect direction sense, as they are able to detect the planet’s magnetic field.

Really? Magnetic Field? Drop the Direction Sense, unless you can come up with a better reason.

Perhaps Ambidextrousness Discipline should be Ambidexterity? It does seem odd that the big down side of a low Agility is off hand penalties that can be negated with a single discipline.

Also the majority of skills give a bonus the 12th stat level, why not make them all scale the same.

The resistance modifiers are basically scaled so you will end up with either no bonus, or a minus 1 or plus one. If that is how it is just drop the issue because nobody will have a combined score like you are showing.

Perhaps you could have presence affect the mental and have endurance do the physical, straight up. Or just have Presence affect both, it would give non priest types a reason to like presence, and in a backwards sort of way it brings luck as an element into the game nicely. It also eliminate almost a page of rules.

You still need parenthesis on the discipline cost list. Is it 20 for weapon mastery 2 or is it 12? Likewise for all skills with this type of listing. I really did think that Hermetic circles cost 13 x circle, which was well stupid of me, but it was also bad formating.

On page 15 you should just make it clear on backstab that the target has their agilty halved for the first round of attacks instead of the confusing "first attack(s)"

blindfighting costs too much. Spell casters can get around this easily, and mundanes shouldn't have to spend a great deal of points to just find an even footing, maybe blindfighting could cost something like 4 or 5 points.

Does evasion preclude the use of a potion, it seems to imply that it does.... "must forgo all other actions"

On a side note, Rob have you included, or will you include the Magic Acuity skill archetype in your future games, I hope you will.

Why can't people cast spells with a shield, but they can if they have a staff, or 2 shortswords?

Still, why the fuck would anyone wear scalemail? or Ring? Armor should give some bonus to dodge, if you don't believe me get in some more fights wearing armor, and without it.

Spell casting should be announced at the beginning of the round. Not on the acting initiative. People should announce what they rolled and what they are trying to cast. If they want to change spells they should have a penalty to their initiative.

whoa, if I attack a 15th level fighter who is asleep as an assassin the worst the outcome will be is that the character in question that I attack will wake up and have 1 hp. sweet. page 37. Why does it matter if it's a blunt weapon when I bash some guys skull in who is asleep? I don't think a mace or a dagger would make that much difference to a sleeping guy......really.

How many attacks does the Assassin get to take on Randolph? One on hand, and one off, or a full round of attacks? Page 37.

Thats all I can read right now.

really you want some input?

Ok, so here it is. Now I really have to reach here because the map is cool, but I have a few things. If Mark reads this he can use the title Heuristitist for any credits for me. Please us my family name Den_H.... first name Paul, etc. I don't know if it's a real word, but I like it so suck on it.

So I said here it is, and well, without further ado. You don't have river names, and there should be a city, or fort, I prefer a fort, where the 2 rivers from the Zhelve and the Valstach meet. You also should have a city or fort, or whatever above Umrecht Keep on the first fork of the river there, what is it's name? Preferably the City on the river from the Valstach and the one from the Zhelve should not be on the coast but instead inland where the 2 rivers meet before moving out to sea. There also should be a road from Timorans Well or whatever it's called over the the new city I propose near the e in Zhelve. Why? Well If there were colonies built and guilds affecting trade they would want something in these spots. Rivers are as you know really important, and if you just look at the map you see how these changes would affect trade. Hell I think a character who wanted to found cities or forts at these locations would have a lot of friends, and enemies perhaps.

2nd, there aren't many cities or villages near forests, wood is a commodity. There never is a foresters guild, don't get me wrong, the map is great, it's just that I thought I'd share. I guess I'm just saying, when you design a map a part of it that is often left out is how are goods moved around. I can't say I have an awesome map myself, but I also haven't offered it up for critique.

So, again the map is indeed good, I just think that regions are isolated, and that there are guilds, and groups in the world you have described that would have addressed some of these things, which the map should reflect.

Maybe I'm wrong, let me know.

Or just publish it, cause it's a nice map. cheers.

Rob

Yeah, I know. This is pro. Seriously, let me know if you catch any spelling mistakes, or if anything looks weird.

MARK?!!!111

OMFG.

Holy. Fucking. Shit.

Rob

Yeah, better. This is also on the factory gmail account, but it's so good it's here as well. This is still in progress. If you guys have any comments, better get them in quick.

EDIT: For instance, I just realized Bordermarch and Vesbridge are in the wrong locations.

Mark (potion of contentment)

I failed my save
I thought it was my water
It makes me feel glad

Better? That's crazy. Leo is crazy.

Anyway, I haven't heard, what's the verdict on Priest domains? Primary, Secondary, etc?

I might need to call you before this Friday release, Rob.

Rob

Quest for the Crown is brilliant. The credits...

If you like the map I sent, just wait til you see the color version. Wow is it fucking good. Still in progress, but it should be ready in a few days.

Faith Magic: Circle/Domain/Alphabetical sounds good. The glossary is more important.

I dunno about putting it in column format. On the other hand, it might be nice just to start making the formatting decisions, so that future editing can easily be incorporated into the existing structure. Yeah, fuck it, go ahead.

Random Haiku always knows.

Exhausted, he rests
For unicorns and fairies
Please, give me a break

Mark

The faith magic list. -It is blowing my mind.

I'm not sure what you were saying about it, Rob. I read your post a few times, but to no avail.

Basically, I made a spell list that sorts first by circle, second by domain, and third alphabetically. That works fine, but finding the spell in the description section isn't so easy as the domain isn't listed at the top of the individual spell description.

An alternate is to keep things the way they were, but have the appendix listing go circle-domain-alphabet. -That way characters can easily determine which spells they can cast, but find the descriptions alphabetically.

I'm going to start in on the spell glossary tonight.
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As for the Narbohring map. -It's fucking awesome. Rob, you should post it to the gmail account so people can see it. Your future Narbohring campaigns are going to be pretty fresh.

When it's done, one option is to put it on the site with links on cities and features. We could have hover box descriptions or links to descriptions.
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Finally, do you think we should run with the column format for the beta version? That will be the final layout format. Also, we could use the final font. I'm planning on spending my Thursday night prepping the beta version, making page numbers make sense, etc...