ORCs, Evil or just Opposition?

You may remember this discussion from a while ago, and in an effort to not disrupt things I held back my thoughts, now that its all settled (agree to disagree) The underlying issue with the Orc question seems to be, can evil be normal, or is it something else?

How can Evil Exist?

If Evil is a thing, a force, it is surely destruction. the desire to destroy for no other reason. there can be justified reasons when the need for one thing is greater than the need for a second thing and the first cannot exist without the destruction of the second, yet is that evil?

Laziness, maybe.

If there is a plot of land. 10m x 10m in Soviet Russia known as a sotka. It can cope with a house, a garden enough to grow food for one person for a year, and nothing else. if you need some of that land for a driveway and a carport for your car, you will need to destroy the garden. but do you?

You can move some of the soil needed for the garden into raised beds, ones that use 'vertical space' so the garden 'space' is not destroyed, just moved. 

When You want to replace a very old house that has started to rot, you could take it apart plank by plank, discover all the reusable parts and store them for later use, maybe even in this new house, but the time cost to do that is greater than you can afford, so you employ a demolisher who rips down the house quickly, and throws away all the old wood. Destruction yes.. evil? hmm

If someone has not been trained to understand the cost of both sides, the benefit to store and keep the old wood, and the cost of time to take it apart, they have been trained only to demolish, this is not evil, its just a lack of choice. they know no other.

As a result, often, cultures that understand the choice, and come to other cultures that know no other choices, will likely expect them to learn of the choice, understand that destruction is evil, and creation is good. and so, choose creation.

Yet, if that culture, understanding that loss occurs with destruction, but instead of wanting to grow, wants all others to shrink, through destruction.. is that evil? well surely yes.

Orks are Evil.

This is my world is the evil of the Ork. They may wear armour they have scavenged from their enemies dead, as it afford them more time to destroy more of their enemy, and this is a good idea, but to take the time to create the armour? the cost for them is the time that could have been more destruction, would 10 years of creating armour create more destruction, no, because ultimately, the armour itself must also be destroyed, 

even the destruction of themselves, through scarring, tattoos, piercings is considered a good way to participate in destruction. Old age is not considered good, If the amount of food they consume equates to 100kg of destruction, yet a younger man with the same food produces 200kg of destruction, and there is only one serve of food. the younger will get it, they will use the energy to destroy and the net output of destruction is served. as such, elderly orcs will often sacrifice themselves to the horde. their knowledge will only lead to more creation, 

Humans have both capacities, can be trained in both capacities, and the path of creation leads to more creation, while the path to destruction always ends somewhere. the benefit of destruction is only to an evil god who wants more 'destruction', the 'food' they live on is destruction. So while some humans left with little choice, understanding, or training will resolve to destroy, as they know, no other way, or are too stubborn to change, the orc even when presented with the opportunity to learn it all, will only choose destruction. 

Some scholarly magi, imprisoned some Orks and only gave them the choice to create, with magic, all destroyed items healed and destruction was no a choice, the Orcs slowly grew into what seemed like 'normal' intelligent beings, yet the minute they left the confines of the magical box that always healed everything, and destruction became a choice once more, they reverted almost instantly, and within months were not just savage, but moreso, their knowledge on how to destroy more effectively lead to entire tribes of Orks wiping out civilisations, until such time the chieftains died, their knowledge gone with them, the squabbling tribes after fell into old ways and were soon, destroyed, but not before wiping out continents of humans. 

The Orks are not evil? well, I beg to differ. 

Playing as an Ork, expect your campaign to end violently

If a Player wants to play as an Ork. Sure, it'll be an interesting thought experiment, as long as they, at every choice, can destroy something. it'll be true to the Ork nature.

Arrive at a door, smash it down, enter a house, any furniture? smash it out of the way, fireplace? chuck everything in the fire so the place burns. people? kill them, why not? oh because my friends will block me? can I kill them? so I can kill the others? yes? ok, do it. no? oh, then I need to get more muscle, steal a deadlier weapon, then kill them, anyone who blocks an Ork from being able to destroy something needs to be so obviously stronger else the Ork will try to kill them. the only blocker is 'fear' that the other Ork wants to destroy it first, and by killing them, less destruction will happen.

An Ork player will need to always be 3rd in rank or lower, always seeking a way to survive long enough to eventually overthrow the leader, and make the choices.

A female Ork, giving birth to an Ork will know that their child will destroy more, will raise their little carnage beast with the expectation to destroy others. 

A Half Ork female will likely kill their offspring, as the capacity for any other race to destroy is less than an Ork, instinctively, so the child will not live. Only human females, having been forced, by an Ork that satiates its lust, and failed to kill the mother, will be born. Human females, unable to destroy that which they have themselves created, even if it is less than it should/could be, will raise the child as best they can. 

Players should determine how much 'destruction' they have in them based on their wisdom, charisma and Peity.

The Ork Gods won't like half Orks running around, and the more Pious the half breed is, the god will get their 'claws' into them. The GM can just 'influence' all Ork related encounters to be a little harder, deadlier or more often when a Half Ork becomes Pious.

Playing as an ORC on the other hand...

Remember that DD12 allows for races of other worlds to bleed through, so Orcs (note the spelling) might come through from another dimension. As I am to understand, these Orcs might have some form of hair growing from their skulls, they might communicate rather than decimate. They might not even BE Evil?! 

Players be warned

A non-evil Orc is not easy to play, while your in game friends may not communicate outright hatred or distrust, the GM should always be feeding your lines about how people will glance in your direction nervously, your comrades should accidentally make racist remarks, or concepts the might hurt your feelings are actually meant to, Orks are not Orcs.

But, this is ROLEPLAY, you're meant to be dealing with other worldly situations that put you in discomfort, so you as a player can expand your mind and abilities in the real world.

Have at it. Smash, Bash, Crunch and Grind, an Ork Life is full of FUN!   

PAX AUS 2022 - Cataclyzm

 This year I went to PAX, I was invited to run my game (as an Indie Australian Designer) and so I went.

Running Cataclyzm, for Strangers

This is a mini document on how, after running 5 sessions, I felt that running Catacylzm works best.

First, Lets discuss how I went into this, I had an idea of an approximate session length, PAX Aus was 2 hours, so I planned for 3 phases. The first being an Introductionary sequence, such as a mini combat, because almost all RPGs have some kind of combat system. Second I wanted to show off one of the three other variants of the game, Social conflict, Trade or the Powers that be. Lastly, I wanted a final showdown, the players now using their gained knowledge to take on something bigger, maybe something too big, so I could show off the 'size' rules.

This didn't go according to plan, of course.

PAX 2 hours, is more like 90 minutes. Players don't always turn up on time, so you kinda need to give players 10 minutes to get to your table. so you end up explaining the game 2-3 times as each player(s) arrived. holding off, means your existing players are bored. 

To combat this, the first players get their character templates first, and based on what they choose, I start to explain the world from THEIR perspective. 

Templates? 

Yes, at a Convention, you do not have the time to go through swathes of choices, even if a player knows exactly what they want, there are choices on HOW they want it. 

Sorry players, not happening. 

So instead I have pre-written characters that has the generic sets of skills & stats based on what they are likely to be doing.

For Catacylzm, I had Warrior, Ranger (with knives), Scout (with sling) and Shaman (with Herbs.. more on this later)

The rest might likely have spoiled the game. The Shaman was a mix of Mage, Priest, Academic and Trader, which took care of those roles where needed. The Scout was both Rogue, Trader and Ranger, while the Ranger was actually less about Range, and tad more about combat, while the Warrior was a Barbarian. just hit things.

So there wasn't really a need for Healer, Smith, Noble or the dedicated Priest, Monk, Mage or Academic, and Trader was only a subset for this world.. (for the moment)

I had intended to make up laminated level up cards, and let players start with one of them, I wish I had in the end, It would have saved a chunk of time, less need for specific character sheets, oh, white board markers would have been better too.. I have them somewhere..

So also, Games kinda needed to end 5-10 minutes early so players could get to their next event. Some players actually left after an hour, we had to 'poetically' write them out of the quest.

So, As often as not, I'd explain Cataclyzm from the lifestyle chosen, then a new player would arrive, I'd explain it further from their point of view, and so on, until I had a player count max, or it was 10 minutes in and we should start. 

Once the players were settled, I'd explain the flood, the situation and how, as young teenagers they were sneaking off, as a group, properly for the first time. (Their Parents knew what was going on, but sadly, they also knew this world was harsh, food was scarce, either they'd return with food, or not return and less mouths to feed)

being a Con, I didn't want to go down all the political choices of Cannibalism, or Cremation, 

The Players would choose a direction, as each session changed the 'known' map, each subsequent group had more information to choose a different direction. 

I rolled dice against the chart of things, modified by the distance from the village, and IF it was travelled before, and got some interesting things.

There were some small creatures to fight, or remains of other adventurers, or a crazy trader who was dangerous, til eventually the players crossed..

The Threshold

At a distance, beyond the collective dreams of the village, nightmares latch onto the thoughts of travelers. I asked my players questions.

If you were to think of a creature, what part would make it more :

Fearsome, Scary, Comical, Dangerous

What defines its:

Strengths, Weaknesses, strangeness.

The Players would give answers, I'd write them down, and formulate a creature from this.

Our Creature for these 5 session? The Jabber-wocky-cat? kinda?

Between the descriptions of Teeth, Spines, Claws, Spittle, were also, Hairless cat, Blue purple Fur Shoulders, Two Heads, Laser Beam eyes, extreme Long Leg bones, impervious to steel, but vulnerable to fire, it was a calm creature, yet vicious when damaged. 

Reminder, the first group described only 4 of these traits, the next, added 2 more, and then a further 2, then the last two groups, added 7 each (larger groups on Sunday)

The reason to do it this was, is to have survivors, return to the Village and 'describe' what they saw, how it fought, and while the later traits might be as obvious, they were not noticed 'at the time'

If players defeat the creature, they skin it there on the field, bring back key items, the creature was too large to bring it all home, so they choose a 'part' each.

Had we more time, I would have focused the last 15 minutes on improving the village each time, crafting something from the returned materials, improving the game for the next group.

Surprisingly to me, we had no TPKs, the groups managed to figure out enough of what was going on, fast enough to take down the creature. We had some losses, an arm here, some legs there,

The Last group went way of track, and I had to reinvent everything over for them, so we ended up in a limestone spillway, with glow in the dark fish, a huge barracuda and some dimension warp bats. 

What next..

I'll likely draw up the map for that Village, add it to my documents, their region being a plain of stone for the Jabber-cat, and some caves of timewarp bats. It'll create a new 'encounter' list, for some future session. 

What I'd like to do next, is somehow make it a live document, and allow those players to return, make some choices, guide the village further, then at a future con, we come back for an Ultimate showdown. 

Lets wait and see

Red pill, $10mil, Blue Pill $10 a click - Meme Math

 

1 month to hit 10 mill.. I’ve done the math, Blue pill, every single instance, here’s why:

Google 200bpm playlist.

https://jog.fm/popular-workout-songs?bpm=200 as an example.

You’ll find hundreds of songs you can click your fingers to, and you’ll barely notice you’re doing it.

2 hands, 200bpm = 400 clicks. I just did one as a test and could click in the ‘off beat’ just as easy without any issue, but lets stick to average folk.

400 click = $4k 10 songs, 3 minutes each, 30mins of listening to the playlist and clicking, and you’re up $120k

do this in the morning as you get ready, and in the night before bed, and 20mins for lunch, and that $10mil? will only be a month.

A MONTH!

Hang on, that's a lot of clicking right?

Lets tone it down.. you get ready in the morning, put on one of these songs and just click away for an hour, but you’re not always clicking, and not to every song, so lets say you only clicked one hand, and for only half the songs.

85 days.. or 3 months.. and you’ve got 10 mil.

Lets be realistic, you don’t need 10 mil right now,

Ok, ok, lets be more realistic

the Taxman is going to catch onto your magic powers, and if you took $10mil, good luck trying to prove its yours. 

What do you need, a down payment on a home loan? proof of income for 2 months? a car to get around, and general bills

So, put on Black Eyed Peas Hey Mama, 3 minutes at 200 bpm, you've just pocketed $6 grand.

Pay off your bills, take your partner out for dinner, relax. 

Set up a cash business, you need to create a 'means' by which you're getting this money.

Something that will bring in a half mil a year, without blinking.

Something you can be 'clicking' along to a song, and no-one will care.

A "thrift" store. Antiques, curios, exotic object de art. 

Go buy a bunch of random $10 items from other thrift stores, just 'click' your fingers a few times to pay for them, bring them to your location as 'donated' items. 

Put 2 prices on everything, one in red, one in blue.

When people ask, the red price, at 1/3rd the blue price, is for 'members'. Membership is $1000, unless you are referred, then its $100, cash.

Nice people come in? offer them the referral price, but put it in the books at normal price, and click your fingers to a Beatles song while they fill in the books.

All your books are blue prices, All your customers pay red prices.

You can even set up the system, so employees will follow the rules, your books look correct, you pay tax correctly, you have a very decent income, no-one misses out (you even pay taxes on the 'full' amount. Why would the Taxman even come looking if it appears you're paying full tax on it all.  

All set! 

Monty Haul Paradox

 Something ha s been bothering me about the Monty haul Paradox, and maybe I'm still wrong yet, I think I figured it out.

The Monty Haul Paradox - Paradox?

What is the Monty Haul Problem:

A Man at a Game Show is presented with 3 doors, behind one is a car, and behind the other 2 are goats. The contestant wants the car. He is instructed to pick a door. Once chosen the presenter opens a door and shows a goat, and then gives the contestant the chance to change. Should he.

The Average non mathematician will consider that the choice is 50/50 as there are now 2 doors, one with a goat, one with a car. 

Mathematicians though, insist that the chance is now 66.6% to swap. The reasoning is, the original theorem of the 3 doors. having one revealed when you had a 1/3rd chance, means statistically the door you have chosen was likely a goat. 

The graphs makes it 'clearer' there are 3 red end points, vs 6 green end points, so 6 of 9 choices or 2/3rds chance you'll be getting the car. right?

Now I can follow the logic of this, you can google it yourself to see the logic, and I guess its kinda makes more sense from that point of view, if you change it to 10 doors, where you choose 1 door, the presenter reveals 8 goats, and now you have 2 doors, do you want to change, but I spotted a flaw.

The Presenter, chose a goat door. of 2 possible goat doors, If you HAD chosen the car, he has 2 choices of goats to choose from, and if you had NOT chosen the car, he can only choose the 'other' goat.

Negating the presenters choice from the math, of course shows it to skew towards 66%, but if you spread out all choices with the presenter included, we return to 50/50.

In the chart above, we looked at 3 red vs 6 green. but forgot, that each red shows 2 choices. include them, and we're back to 6 vs 6 = 50/50. I don't have 3 dimensional excel to show it, so I need to split it out like this: 

Lord Tax: (a lost art) Peasants and their Heroes

 In days gone by, the King taxed the lords, not the people.

A Medieval tax system (that could work today)

a Lord was a land owner, and the lord paid a tax on the earnings of the land potential, not its actual. So the lord would need to downplay his lands worth, rocky terrain, forested ridges, valleys and peaks, all un workable land, then get as much profit from the land with as many serfs as he could afford to feed.

Fantasy Roleplay, puts our adventurer outside this system. or as children of the system, who have revolted against such a system. They go off, land and lordless, to gain riches, and in theory become lords themselves if they are successful or die trying.

But how should you roleplay the serfs? Do they look at heroes as... 'super heroes'? or as 'lawless thugs'. Well this would depend on what's happened before.

Maybe the Lord has hired the characters to deal with some issues with monsters, and they are treated as heroes, or maybe the characters failed to do their duty, or messed it up so badly, the monster had its revenge, and the townsfolk suffered, so the town blames the 'heroes' as good for nothing murder hobos. Given the success rates of some games, I'd suggest each town will have a % chance of the two variants, and will have, over the years, built up a love or hatred of heroes in general.

So how would you set this up to play?

If you are randomly determining each town & their past experience, I'd have a % roll of people who believe in the hero & % of those who distrust the hero, making for an interesting dynamic when there is a cross over of people who 'understand' that heroes are super human, yet still flawed humans.

Belief roll for the populace:

<10% little to no experience of heroes doing good deeds, so no discounts, no special attentions, 

10-25% low experience, maybe a lone person might see them for who they are and ask about their deeds from boredom.

25-50% average experience, will pay respects in taverns, maybe 5% discount on large orders, +1 to comeliness checks.

50-75% higher experience, folks will tip their hat in the street, greet with respect, base 10% discount and +d4 comeliness checks. 

75-90% very high experience, expect to see several other heroes in this town, people will treat the hero as a friend, 15% base discount and +d4+1 comeliness checks

90%+ some previous heroes saved the town so well, the expectation for the heroes will be overt, any failure to be a high ranking or powerful hero will backlash and the heroes will be specifically treated like +25% anger chart. If they manage to keep calm and cope with the adoration & expectation (15th+ hero skills) they will be praised, 20% base discount, +2d4 comeliness checks.

Anger roll for the populace:

<10% little to no experience of heroes doing bad deeds, so no discounts, no special attentions, 

10-25% low experience, maybe a lone person might see them for what they are and yell insults.

25-50% poor experience, will avoid in taverns, maybe 5% surcharge if the barkeep thinks he can get away with it, +1 to comeliness checks +1 to barbrawl chance.

50-75% v.poor experience, folks will walk around in the street, or if ranked high enough challenge openly, -10% to an discount checks, +1 comeliness checks & +d4 to barbrawl chance. 

75-90% hatred, expect to be accosted by the guards for minor infractions, plus all the above, townsfolk will openly (yet in groups) jeer at the heroes, telling them to go home. 

90%+ upon entering the town, expect the heroes to be stalked by a small crowd, as the crowd swells, they'll throw rotten fruit and give chase, chasing the heroes out of town, "We don't want your kind here".

Interesting Mixes

If you roll above 30% on one roll and under 30% on another its fairly easy to see what kind of town this will be, yet if you roll very high on both, the town itself will likely be divided, like a football team or political parties, there will be common brawls over if a hero group was loved or hated for its prior actions. the loved will focus on the good deeds, but the hated will focus on the costs of those deeds, and as GM you'll need to figure out whose side is stronger based on the rolls and the direction of your plot.

If your players suffer a massive defeat and are feeling down, maybe the next town they come across will raise their spirits and give them a reason to go on, Or, if your players are getting a bit cocky, maybe raise the anger scale, bring their humility down a few notches. Also, its not a terribly bad chart to use when your own players are staying for a while. each good deed adds another 2d6 %, but each misstep (failed or perceived to have failed) will add to the anger by d6. you can track them, maybe -1% every 3 months from both tracks, so players feel like they're earning their reputation, without needing to use the full reputation rules from the HUB book. 

Side Note:

Modern Taxes, why is it that the poor pay both a tax to the govt, and a tax to the land lord (rent) Have we gone backwards since medieval times? Surely we should have figured this out by now, that only land owners pay tax.

Some Magic Items, are not cursed, just.. expensive..

Looking at some of the movies and the artefacts they give us, can influence or create ideas:

StormBreaker: the Cursed Axe

Our Hero, finds this massive axe, finding he has the strength to wield it, he enters battle, and mid fight, when the player rolls a double 12, the GM determines that this "double bad" can mean the discovery of the "curse" of the axe.

The GM asks the player, you know this is bad, so I'll get you to roll a d6, but I'll let you add a number to it of your choice, which will affect the power of this axe. The Player chooses 10, and rolls a 5. 

The Axe flies from his hands, lightning crackles from its metallic sheen, the axe embeds itself into the opponent, taking 225 damage, yet microseconds later, the opponent disintegrates the axe slowed, still continues its arc into the ground, and within a 15ft radius, all creatures take 15 damage, they are mostly killed.

The character though, our hero, is drained by 15 magic points, magic he doesn't fully have, this, according to magic rules, causes some physical damage, and severely hampers his ability to regain magic (the negative modifier cancels out any natural regeneration rate, and % chance to learn)

Stormbreaker is just a regular axe, mostly. It only becomes dangerous when you try to actually channel power through it.

Captain America was able to swing it, when needed, as a plain axe, no lightning going off.

Thor understood that the Axe would drain off power, to cause its effect and thought "their bodies would crumble and their minds collapse" 

Mjolnir, has its own, internal MP to enact its powers, but Stormbreaker conjures lightning bolts and open portals, siphoning off your own power.

If you have no MP to give Stormbreaker, you’d be literally draining your lifeforce (blood magic). Your very natural essence would be drained away, and you would die.

For a god like Thor, or anyone else who has loads of energy stored inside of them, that’s no problem. The weapon would just amplify and project whatever power you normally produce without it.

But for non magic users, it’s very dangerous.

This gives GMs a whole set of 'effects' that create magic items, that act like curses. Draining the life force of a person, causing negative effects, where else have I seen that?

Harry Potter, carrying the Horcrux, he and his companions, magic users at least, were being constantly drained, and an effect of it was a poisonous effect on their mind. Doesn't need to be a 'curse' effect that is laid upon a player, instead its a result of the negative MP score. 

The story might have a magic item, something like a bracelet, that makes the player 'feel more powerful' maybe bestowing a +1 STR value, BUT each time the STR component might be needed, the GM imposes a -1MP modifier, the object is draining the players magic to 'cause' it to work. if the player is not a magic user, the effect is recorded by the GM but the affected hero would feel the results.

any Strength task that is at least half of the STR value of the character, would trigger, minus a MP from them, and slowly, be draining their life as per blood magic rules.

The player would only get informed of the modifier once they reached the -1 effect to their character sheet. Taking the bracelet off won't affect the drain, since the drain is on the character, The player might think they are cursed, go to a shaman or healer, and have the curse lifted. no effect. the player, unaware or unsure, but put the bracelet back on. 

Only if they put the bracelet on a magic user, who then uses their strength to perform an action will notice the subtle change, the MP cost, and realise, the 'cursed' character is actually just magic drained.

The Beauty of this, the players have discovered a negative, they search out the negative, and if they experiment with the bracelet, they'll stumble on the clue and realise what's happened. The MP can be restored with rest & channeling from the mage, the players all learn something about the rules of magic, the players figure it out for themselves, instead of the GM force-feeding them the knowledge, and it can last several sessions, the 'fighter' being "ill" for several sessions, not knowing how / why, but in effect being a whole level worth of stats lower than usual, forcing the group to rethink their game plan for several sessions. 

Game Idea: Dice Bag Upgrade Decisions game

Concepts:
Dice bag builder

Decision Game

---

You start with some dice, that give you basic abilities, somewhat like a deck builder.

You can buy more dice to add to the bag, you can sell dice to remove them from the bag. you can increase the number of dice you roll from the bag, you can pre-roll a dice and have it 'always' come up, or just repeat.

You start with a bag of 7 dice (arbitrary) and you 'push out' 5. instead of drawing them, because you could in theory feel the dice and knowingly draw what you want.

You roll the dice you drew (or maybe you roll them as they come from the bag)

The dice tell you what your action choices are. maybe you get boots, and can move, maybe swords and can attack, maybe magic to cast a spell, maybe specific magic icons = specific spells. 

Maybe its a roleplay game, you use the rolls of the dice as your action, and when you go to town, you are able to buy/sell dice then?

Maybe its a town builder, where your resources are put into place to enact choices, if you add a 'warrior' dice to the bag, you can use a warrior IF there is a monster, but if there is not, you can't. 

Just some thoughts.

FOMO, Buying Board games and Decisions

 I wandered past a board game shop the other day and they had a game I've wanted on sale on the front window.

Classic Dungeon Crawler, nice range of minis, some new features that make it a little unique.

I was tempted to buy it. I wanted to have it. It was on special, the only questions I ask myself are, do I want it? And, is it just going to become junk I have to get rid of at some point?

On the first point, I found myself answering with a full-throated ‘yes’. I saw it, and I saw myself playing it every weekend for weeks, painting the miniatures, playing with friends and family.

I loved that vision.

But what I’ve learnt, as someone who has bought many Dungeon Crawlers and Narrative based big box games, only to have them sit, on the shelf, unplayed for years, is that you can’t trust that vision.

Because that vision is only a brief moment in time, and doesn’t capture the full experience of owning a board game.

I mean, it’s been a long time since I could get 6 friends together, regularly, every weekend. So that vision of me playing is primarily built on many years of playing with friends, after school, on weekends and school holidays.

The vision of arranging friends, ringing the group, ensuring snacks were covered, arrival times sorted, was definitely not inspiring.

I’ve got better things to do with my weekend.

And there’s also the reality that I’ve got a family, 2 jobs, and a house that needs constant cleaning and some repairs. There’s a very VERY good chance that while intentions are good, It'd be blocked by life events and peter out.

That’s not particularly inspiring either.

And so when I caught myself and took a look at the full reality of owning a board game, I realised I wasn’t really into it.

As much as I loved the ideal vision – as appealing as that was – I just wasn’t up for the reality of making it happen.

This is a trick a lot of us fall into.

Like, we want to become ballerinas because we love the idea of looking breathlessly beautiful on stage while Tchaikovsky gently plays, but very few of us are up for years of toe-torture and training.

Or we want to tree-change and move to some rural acreage because we love the idea of sitting on the back verandah watching the sun setting through the gums.

But then we get there and realise that that vision involves endless whipper-snippering and helping cows give birth.

We get drawn to moments. We get seduced by moments. But moments only exist in long journeys that lead us to them.

And while we might love the idea of a particular moment, when we’re setting our life’s goals (or deciding what toy to buy next) we have to look at the journey.

And the big implication here is for goal setting. When you’re setting your life goals, don’t fixate on moments. Lock on to journeys and ways of being.

These should be the stars that guide you.

[Game Idea] The Village

 Its Medieval-Fantasy, The World is in ruins once again after the great evil has attacked the world, and the heroes have defeated him, and his minions scramble for the pockets of power, or Escape from the wrath of the heroes. You and you 2 friends, tire of fleeing, you find a small lush valley and decide to settle, come what may.

Build your Village, Deckbuilder, Tableau

Expectation, 1- X players, engine builder, Deck Builder, 

You start by drawing 10 cards, discarding 2 and playing 3 basic cards. Basic cards are things like 'house' 'hunter' 'fisherman' they don't require any other cards on the table. You have a hand of 5 cards.

All cards have a 'cost' even basic cards, Basic cards usually have only 1 cost, the higher the cost, the less basic the cards

The Cards will have their own words of what they do. 90% of them will say "provides [symbol]"

You play the game by tapping a card, which provides a resource, then you use that resource to play a card from your hand.

Cards do not untap normally, instead you need to use your house card

 Basic [Wood], hut - Tap the House to untap 2 other cards (buildings?)
 Int [Wood, Nails, hut] - house - Tap the House to untap 3 other cards (buildings)
Basic [ Wood, Spear ] - Hunter - Tap the Hunter to untap 1 house, or draw basic cards. 

SO, you can see, houses untap buildings to show people have gone to sleep, Food untaps houses, to show people have eaten.

Now we can get into the interesting cards

Each round, everyone draws up to 5 cards (or refreshes and draws a full hand?)

Everyone plays a round of building, taping cards to gain resources to pay for new cards, building an engine of cards and card combos.

At the end of the round, everyone passes 1 card to the player on their left (or discards 1 card if solo)

Then must play a 'nighttime card', if they don't have a nighttime card to play, they pass that player a card. If Solo, play nighttime on self or discard 2 cards.

Nighttime cards are monsters or enemies from the surrounding lands, they come and destroy buildings, if there are no guards to block them. Players will need 1-2 guards early in the game, but later, when basic deck is exhausted, more dangerous monsters will come.

Basic Cards: 
Woodsman - wood
Mine - ore/stone
Wheat Farm - wheat
Town Square (early guards) - defend / draw new cards from basic/intermediate
Outpost - draw intermediate cards
Tower - defend +1 cards to draw phase
Animal Farm - animal hides

Intermediate Cards
Tanner, - 
Blacksmith - Draw int/Adv cards / turn ore into metal
Logging Camp
Carpenter - draw int/adv cards / turn wood into planks


Equipment cards, usually discarded or used for forced pass cards, eventually allows people to draw more cards in the draw phase. 

The End goal? Possibly to build a complete wall around the village, or, to survive until the end of the deck, or maybe points are awarded for certain buildings, and a score of 50 ends the game. (each building having score, if you build lots of smaller buildings, or just a few of the larger ones.  

Ranking Games

 There's a lot of controversy on Board Game Geek, ignoring the bulk of it, I want to focus on one that comes up time and again. The game ranking system.

Ranking Games to avoid hyper numbers

The Main issue, in board game rankings, complained about the most, is the assignment of a value system. The 'arbitrary 1-10 vote' you assign to a game. Anyone can vote for any game, and as a result, there is a very easily abusable way social media can push a game into the top 100, when it hasn't even been played, or people voting down a game to offset this.

A system that could replace this, has to allow for people to vote, has to include some bias for new accounts vs long term accounts, but also, needs to allow for the varied ways people vote. 

If a game has just arrived at your house, and you play it, and love it, surely you're going to vote it into your top 10, but as time goes by, and you get newer games, should you need to go back and vote that game down, so you can allow for your next great loved game to take that top position?

Games that last the test of time, need to be able to rise above. Games which are a fad, games which are fun today yet boring tomorrow, who is going to go back and edit all their previous posts & scores and change to reflect this?

Sites haven't yet incentivized people to do this, and they could, but they don't feel the need for it, and it'd be a lot of work for very little gain.

But, having thought this over for many years now, this one clicks for me:

1. BGG (or alternative) Idea: When you 'vote' for a game, you vote it against another game you voted for. When you vote you are presented with one or two other games from your list, and asked. of the games shown: * If you are showing this to new players, which would you choose. * If you are playing this with friends, which would you choose * Its your birthday, you choose what ever game YOU love.

 

The game is not stored as a number, instead its stored as a list. your ranking, of your games, from least to most, in three very relevant situations.

Computers, which can crunch numbers quickly can assign a weighting to your list from 0 to 1, and use this weighting to 'list' all games in the system.

This will create a top 10, or top 100, without needing to score them as 10s. The top 10, will reflect  the games that of all games voted for, so far, these games have the most people, saying it is their best game.

There will be no need to chastise the hundreds of people saying its a '10' because they haven't, they've just said, of all the games 'they' have played, its in first place.

Anyone who votes a game down to 'tank' its ratings, are doing nothing more than voting all the games above it, as being better. In their opinion.

Participants, who have only ever voted for 10 or 20 games, wont be able to influence the system to say their no.1 is the best game ever (or in last, as the worst), because, its only the best game, for them, out of 20 games they've played. (see below for the math)

Furthermore, instead of asking "is this 'the' best game", your asking, Is this game, the better choice, based on your previous rankings, of other games you've experienced. and its asked 3 times, in three ways, that often, don't match. new players, games for your friends, or games for you.   

1. The Math: The Vote system shows you three games, one half way down your list, the other halfway up your list. when you click, the list shifts deeper into your list and again, matches half way up, or halfway down. until it finds its spot. Math shows us, this can only ever, worst case, happen 7 times with 2 values, or 5 times with 3 values. You vote for your games, and they create a list, inside the workings, the computer breaks your list into mathematical % of your whole list, and finds the middle number of that %. i.e. if you have only voted for 5 games, the % of each 'title' is 20%, and the mid point of that is 10, so the games would be weighted 0.1, 0.3, 0.5, 0.7, and 0.9 Note, with only 5 games, your 'lowest' is a 1 and your highest is a 9, you can't vote it to 0 or 10, you haven't got enough experience voting yet. This 'weight' is averaged with all the other votes, but also, with all the not yet votes. If the site requires 1000 votes to record any given game against, all those 999 others have a base score of 0.5 for all games. So, if you're the first person to vote, and you give it top marks? its the best ever game? your 9, combined with 999 5s, will give a final score of 5.004 Its going to be in the middle.
   

 

    And this is what we want, we don't want games with 1 vote, jumping into top place, an we don't want some kind of 'catch system' to say, Oh, we need to have 300 votes before we publicize the number, because, once social media finds out, they'll get 301 people to vote it a 10, and then the opponents of this, will vote 1s to cancel out the ratio, we don't even need the arbitrary 1,000 in there, just give all uses a base 0.5 middle and scale accordingly, sure the math will end up with values between 0.4 and 0.7, but that's also arbitrary, because, the users will only see the 0.7 as 'first' and the 0.4 as 'last'

And if anyone requires to see a 'value' score, then math can easily spread a 0.4 - 0.7, into a 

Combat Stances

 When I started making these rules, I watched a LOT of combat movies, Jackie Chan, and Chuck Norris, and the like. Then I went to some combat schools and asked to take notes. One thing I always thought that looked cool was stances

How Combat Stances work in DD12.

When you 'fight' in DD12 and you're still a low level character, you just do what you want and don't care about how you are perceived, but as time goes on, you need to be able to have an edge over your opponent to ensure you continue to win.

One way to do this, is to study their 'stance' or 'style' by spending a few round, letting your opponent attack you and focusing instead on defending, each 'round' your opponent attacks and you defend, you can take the difference as XP in a extremely specialized skill named "opponent style- <name of opponent> The maximum XP you can gain is governed by how much they fail by, divided by your 'study opponent' skill modifier (which divides by 2 for each +1 you have)

Since this follows the skill progression rules, a mere 15 XP will give you a score of 5, which denotes as a +1 against your opponent. this divide by 5 can also be improved by improving your 'study opponent' score. Yet it also reduced each +1 you gain, so a 'score' of 9 is +2, then 12 is a +3, 14 becomes a +4 and each score above this is a further +1. maxing out at 20 (when rolls are no longer needed/allowed) for a +10.

a +3 is more than enough for any character to be able to best the opponent, applied to attack or defense, armour bypass or damage, the character can specialize the skill further into attacks, defenses, damage resistances or damage blocks, allowing a quicker bonus against that opponent.

So. How does one defend against this? well, by evening the scores, studying your opponent in return, determining how their blows land, how they attack, and building up your own knowledge against it. Once your +3 counters their +3, you've gone back to matched battle. 

Then there are obfuscated Moves. Each attack you make, can take a small negative, but is done in such a way, that your opponents ability to understand your attacks will be reduced or nullified, your opponent will not only be unable to properly study your moves, they'll be lead to a false sense of what your scores are, and improperly defend against them, when you stop obfuscating. (and, they'll not know which is which)

But the ultimate defense, is to be trained in one of the many 'stances' that schools train their students.

Stances

Stances usually have a modifier, based on their position, how you hold yourself and present yourself, you might leave yourself open (-3 def), but have quick attacks(+2 att, -1 Init) with penetrative damage(+2 dam p), or vice versa, slow to the uptake (-3 Init, -2 att) but superior blocking skills (+3 def +3 block)    

But the most devastating, is when you learn two stances.. your opponent builds up an understanding of your basic stance, they build their study-opponent up, spending four to eight rounds of combat, allowing you to do the same, then when you're ready, you swap stance. the opponent doesn't understand whats going on, their expectations of your fighting style is completely false and they make moves that leave themselves wide open.

You apply all the first stances positive modifiers to your opponent as negative modifiers, and for each 'study opponent score' you apply your new stance positive modifiers again to your own.

Jackie is fighting Chuck, with Striking Fist Style. Its a simple -2 Initiative, +1 Att, +1 Dam style, -2 Def. Chuck is using his fists of fury style, +1 Att, +2 Dam, -1 Def, over the course of 3 rounds, chuck builds up a score of 12, and Jackie builds up a 9, Jackie can feel that chuck has the advantage, and chuck, thinking this too decides to really start laying some blows. He's right, Jackie takes some incredible hits, and while he gets in one of his own, its barely worth it, so he decides to switch styles. Now, he takes on Drunken Master Style. While he gains no obfuscation bonus, nor damage reduction bonus from the alcohol, he does get the stance modifiers -1 Att, -1 Dam, +4 Def and +2 Resist.

Chuck attempts to attack, and finds his opponent is now longer fighting with fists, instead slapping away his hands, being coy, silly and confusing, none of his hits land, his confidence is shattered, this guy can counter every move.

Jackie's modifiers were as follows, Chuck had a +3, so Jacking Drunken style was not the quick att+dam style, so Chucks readiness for a speedy attack were leaving him open, His Attack was reduced by 1 and damage by 1 (Striking fist reversed) then when he went to attack this quick style, he instead got a fluid drunk, flowing around him, dodging every move Jackie got chucks +3 x +4 Def = +12, and 3x +2 Resist, for +6. in effect negating chucks attack by 19 points. furthermore, Jackies own study opponent was still +2, he could focus his into attack, and or damage.

Chuck was smart enough to see this was not going to work, and backed down, vowing to return.    

Thoughts on game progression, and roleplay rules

 I'm a big fan of granular rules, yet over time, they get boring. So, I think, games should progressively obfuscate the simpler forms of the game, as you level up.

Game Progression as a mechanic.

Imagine you've never trekked, never strapped a backpack on, hiking boots, and gone for a walk. Those first few hours are going to be painful, difficult, full of mistakes, hardships, and things that you just can't help avoid.

But then imagine how different it will be after a month, 6 months or several years of trekking. 

After a month, the simplest issues will be worked out. the basics of packing a bag, how to put on your boots for better comfort, making sure you don't pack weird shaped items against your back.

After 6 months, ensuring you put on dry socks, and lace the boots against the grain so water flows away, and not into your boot, packing your bags for the most long term comfort, but also quick access to certain items, and packing in under 10 minutes, instead of an hour,

After several years, you'll still be learning small tricks, maybe less often maybe barely a change, but tiny incremental changes that give you extra crucial minutes of travel each day. 

My System Ideas.,

Its one of the reasons I developed the 2d12 bell curved results system, it starts of being harder, 1st level characters, you roll 2d12 and attempt to get your number under the low numbers, and while pass or fail, you gain some experience in the skill, those first few experience will be vital. You'll learn a lot, and your score will rise quickly.

Once you've gained a basic score of 20, there is no longer the need to roll for the simple stuff, this might be dealing with the minutiae or just getting the basics right. We as adults don't think about walking, talking, turning door handles or all the simple things we mastered as children, so why should your character think about any skill they've pretty much covered. The player says they do it, its a straight forward task, so they do it. If they don't KNOW its difficult, you don't tell them, (and secretly roll for that difficulty)

You do need to roll, every single time, someone says something, and ignore 99% of those rolls, so the times when its actually a roll, your players don't know the difference. The key is, does the player THINK they might fail? 

The rulebook says, if the player has a score of 20 (or more), the GM rolls, and if there are no modifiers, ignores this dice roll, unless a 12 is rolled, and the GM has a story reason to do something.

Only if there are modifiers, does this become important. 

If the player suspects its going to be difficult, let them roll, let them apply other skills for bonuses, it shows they are thinking, being creative in solving the problem. rolls = experience. 

But if the player thinks this is going to be a walk in the park, and it might be, then you roll, openly to put players on edge.

The key here is, players will get used to your rolls, and will ignore all the 'probably passed' and like real life, get into a false sense of security, Until its a fail, and then, that world of pain will teach them a lesson.

Rolling dice is barely a second, a glance, not a 12, ok, lets proceed.. but the moment on the persons face when they are so assured they'll swing across the chasm with that worn old vine as a rope, and that vine snaps, with a cloud of dust.. and they drop.. 

and their friends cast a spell, or a prayer or a quick thinking rope & hook, and they're safe, or.. a speedy healing ward as they slam into the ground almost dying.

NOTE: casting healing ward, is 1 HP to a location and 1 HP in general, it can be cast on a person as they hit the ground, and prevent death. Provided no further insta damage occurs (like falling in acid/lava/poison/fire etc) 

But, slowly, as players progress, they'll notice, they're not doing rolls for things, they're not seeing any negatives happen for simple stuff, and consciously or subconsciously they'll feel like they're getting better. This is what you want to achieve as gamemaster, getting players to feel confidence about their character. Feel like they 'Earned' it.

Story Telling Healing

 One thing you might notice in TV shows or books, is that the ability to heal is somewhat related to how important the PC or NPC is. So why doesn't roleplay have something like it.

Healing System, for Narrative Roleplay.

One way to create amore narrative form of roleplay is to take away the direct nature of certain spells or prayers. Such as Healing.

If a Priest has a 'varied' healing system, which has a possible narrative modifier, this might allow good roleplays to use the information to drive the plot forward.

If healing was a % chance to succeed, and that % affected the die rolls, lets say for example the base rate to perform heal on someone at 1st level is 50% of d4. If the d4 roll is a 3, and the roll is under 50%, its a full 3pts, but if the roll is 75.. since its 'failed' by half, you halve the 3pt roll to 1 (rounded down). 
By making the healing varied, you can now add modifiers, such as PC +20%, important NPC +25%, lord or very important +35%.

This tells the players, is this NPC important to the plot, act accordingly. If the Priest goes to heal a dying child from a recent attack on the village, and the DM tells the priest, you have a -15% to the roll, the priest knows, this is not a vital plot character, and act accordingly, 'attempting the heal, but ultimately, knowing the child is dying, the priest doesn't waste important magics on someone that is not vital to the plot.

The players can still heal the child, but they can understand the consequences better for the plot path, and if later, they need that power, and don't have it, they know the cost involved.

This isn't something new players will grasp or understand, power players will only 'heal' important NPCS, and let anyone else die, so if your running an open world, its not likely to work well.

Though, with player driven narrative, they could 'choose' this NPC is important, to gain the bonus, and make the child a plot point.

All interesting.  

Memory, Roleplaying and Character sheets

 In my past, with less than a handful of characters under by belt, I could rattle off the exploits of my hero without missing a beat, and like many younger, or newer players, I would at every opportunity.

Yet, modern players, maybe, I don't see them doing so often, do they already understand that rattling off your fantasy life is boring for people? have they done it too often as kids from other games such as FF7, scoffed at by peers and decided not to espouse their life story with each new audience?

As a result though, I also see this lack of memory, of what's going on. past exploits, past adventures, contacts, locations of known wares. players just don't seem to remember any of this.. Maybe they have 100s of movies and video games that did the same, over and over, and its become a blur. 

So, how do we deal with

Character Memories

As annoyingly boring, we need to record a LOT of this stuff down now. Its vital to be able to call up a contact mid mission and pull in that favour, access that weapon shop, healing potion, special mc'guffin that'll help out in this quest.

Players have enough going on in their actual lives, so when we sit down at the gaming table, how do we have a chance at remembering that town, that shop, that salesman, and the price of the potion of speed that he was selling.

Lazy GMs and lazy systems, make these goods available in ALL towns, ALL shops, so the players don't have to track their way back for it. why? because in computer games, players will get bored, quit, and play another game, instead of taking the required effort, so they drag that feeling into roleplay, and kerplunk, the RPG game suffers.

So, I have sheets I hand out to players, AFTER they meet their first important NPC, where they can jot down relevant info.. why? because then I don't have to remember it.. I have enough on my plate.

Players can record as much or as little, but with ** and * references for 'important to remember' on certain fields, its not hard for players to track the bare minimum, with those prompts.

Also, as time goes by or anytime a player takes a head trauma, a memory spell, or some other reason to forget some information, I can ask a player to roll on the handy chart, and erase memories from the sheet. This creates some great story plots, and roleplay opportunities as times goes by.

Especially with Illusion spells being so common, passing yourself off as someone else only matters if they can't remember the nitty gritty details of an NPC when they should / could.

I tell you, the look on a players face when they meet the Tavern keep, and I say "Here's Bilt, the Bartender, looking like he always does, scar down his left cheek and his clean shaven head. he's maybe grown a beard a bit longer than normal since you saw him, and players glance at their memory sheets, and say. wait on a sec, his scar was on his right cheek wasn't it? I lost that memory when we fought the mind flayer, I'll look at him further, try and nod at my friends to look at him again.. see if they can get it.