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RPG dumping ground: Deadly Maladies
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I found these nasty things in an old dungeon description buried in my files. The Anamab Caverns were deep in a tropical jungle and inhabited by a degenerate race of reptilian humanoids. Enjoy (well maybe not enjoy...)
Legends In Their Own Minds
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When I role-play, I want to experience (echoes of ) what it is like to have adventures.
Encounter Savage! PDF Now Available FREE | UncleBear
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The complete Encounter Savage! is now available as a FREE PDF! This supplement provides rules for adapting the groundbreaking Encounter Critical for use with Savage Worlds! It’s fully illustrated by the man someone might have once called “the modern day Erol Otus”, Xose Lucero! It’s approved by the keeper of the EC flame, S. John Ross! It’s got a Savage Worlds Fan License!
Why the Rule of Cool Is Not Cool
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I’ve been following the debate about the so-called “Rule of Cool.” It’s a “TV Tropes” concept extended to RPGs by the Chatty DM, (original post “The Rule of Cool” here, and clarification “The Rule of Cool Takes Flak” here). A number of people gave it drive-by disses, but I think the most on topic one is from 6d6 Fireball, with Rule of Cool - Only for Idiots and Of Coolness and Idiocy.
In short, the Rule of Cool states “The limit of the Willing Suspension Of Disbelief for a given element is directly proportional to its degree of coolness. Stated another way, all but the most pedantic of viewers will forgive liberties with reality so long as the result is wicked sweet and/or awesome. This applies to the audience in general, as there will naturally be a different threshold for each individual in the group.”
The Professor X Paradox | Critical Hits
Unfortunately, there always seemed to be a wall that our campaigns hit, and has made us reluctant to pick up another superhero game in many years. While discussing the issue and attempting to settle on a new system, The Main Event and I hit on the core of our problem, and we dubbed it “The Professor X Paradox.”
You see, take a typical party. You’re likely to have a wide range of different kinds of heroes in your group. To take some iconic examples, let’s say your party has the Incredible Hulk, Cyclops, and Professor X. Now let’s say, as what often happens in an RPG and in superhero stories, the party gets into a fight. You want to have a challenge for the party members, so you have a brute ala Abomination. Now, for the Hulk, this is an interesting fight. And Cyclops might be able to help out too. But for Professor X, either he’s going to completely take over the Abomination with mind powers and have him pose no threat, or he’s going to get obliterated by one punch from Abomination. Basically, the Hulk’s scale of toughness is so beyond a normal human’s that if you ever have a normal human in the fray, he’s likely to be killed if he happens to get involved in the fray.
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Unfortunately, there always seemed to be a wall that our campaigns hit, and has made us reluctant to pick up another superhero game in many years. While discussing the issue and attempting to settle on a new system, The Main Event and I hit on the core of our problem, and we dubbed it “The Professor X Paradox.”
You see, take a typical party. You’re likely to have a wide range of different kinds of heroes in your group. To take some iconic examples, let’s say your party has the Incredible Hulk, Cyclops, and Professor X. Now let’s say, as what often happens in an RPG and in superhero stories, the party gets into a fight. You want to have a challenge for the party members, so you have a brute ala Abomination. Now, for the Hulk, this is an interesting fight. And Cyclops might be able to help out too. But for Professor X, either he’s going to completely take over the Abomination with mind powers and have him pose no threat, or he’s going to get obliterated by one punch from Abomination. Basically, the Hulk’s scale of toughness is so beyond a normal human’s that if you ever have a normal human in the fray, he’s likely to be killed if he happens to get involved in the fray.
Jeff's Gameblog: a handy tip for CoC keepers, and others
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More importantly, a fair number of those Spot Hidden rolls were scenario breakers. That is to say, if you didn't find the door leading to the ghoul catacombs (or whatever) the adventure was effectively over. Here's how that would work out in actual play, at least when I ran CoC:
Player: My Spot Hidden is 45%, I rolled a 63.
Keeper: Well you find the secret door that leads to the rest of the adventure anyway.
Player: Then why did I roll?
Keeper: Uh...
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