Tabletop Roleplaying Games (D&D, Pathfinder, CoC, ETC.)

[Steinercard]

So I've been reading through Delta Green: God's Teeth after hearing about how heckin gross and ick it is. And feeling quite intrigued because of that. And I feel very underwhelmed. The DTRPG page, synopsis for the book, and the first page of the book warn about how this is so off putting and grimdark and needs all these trigger warnings. Which makes out the book to be the second coming of FATAL. But actually reading the book, you are constantly presented with the psychological horror version of a cock tease. Let me explain.

Spoiler: rant and mild spoilers for God's Teeth

So many times, the book describes a horrific thing. But actually doesn't describe it and tells the GM to not describe it either other than in the most abstract terms. This was kind of annoying on the first few pages where you have a plot critical folder. It's supposed to be ""all the motivation the characters need" to go on the adventure. As other than one PC who is a veteran agent, the party all start off as Delta Green friendlies as opposed to full agents. Great, that's an interesting start to a campaign. So what's "the motivation". The folder is full of what I think is supposed to be ritualized child abuse. I have no idea though because the book doesn't tell me, orders me to not tell the PCs what's in the folder or even just make up my own shit, and lectures me for even being curious about the folder because in a game about personal psychological horror I have to make my PCs feel heckin valid. So the veteran agent has to show this complete abstraction that is just The Horror. And hope that without in anyway telling the other PCs what the contents are or even letting them make it up themselves they just magically have the motivation to plot what is essentially a siege and murder of a rural farmhouse turned orphanage full of slav cultists. That alone is annoying but the book does this MULTIPLE TIMES! In fact, every single aspect of actual horror in this campaign is retarded by the author's sickly fear of getting canceled. See an evil monster? "Don't describe the monster, child abuse is bad and triggering and stuff." It's so self indulgent and makes what could be a great horror campaign completely useless if I follow it RAW.

I would assume if I'm running a FUCKING HORROR campaign I would be playing it with a group who understood that such a thing is inherently unsettling. That this group were all adults who could be trusted to deal with unpleasant themes. Or we wouldn't be playing FUCKING HORROR! Yes, this campaign in particular deals with child abuse and trauma related to such. And I absolutely understand how that can be bothersome to certain people. But those people wouldn't be in my game. I don't need to have whole chunks of an campaign just not explained to me because the author has decided everyone has the same lack of emotional maturity and intelligence as the author and his friends. I can be trusted not to use an RPG to psychologically torture someone intentionally or otherwise. But because SJWs are inherently awful sociopaths who can't be trusted to be mature, everyone else has to be lectured to as if they are immature SJWs just one bad word away from becoming Somallian Soldier style rapists.

I wouldn't even be so mad if I didn't see that there is a good campaign here hidden behind self indulgent and neurotic SJW wanker speech.

 

[Ghostse]

So I've been reading through Delta Green: God's Teeth after hearing about how heckin gross and ick it is. And feeling quite intrigued because of that. And I feel very underwhelmed. The DTRPG page, synopsis for the book, and the first page of the book warn about how this is so off putting and grimdark and needs all these trigger warnings. Which makes out the book to be the second coming of FATAL. But actually reading the book, you are constantly presented with the psychological horror version of a cock tease. Let me explain.

If your players want to see what's inside the folder, hand them a manilla folder with a 8x11 glossy AI-upscaled 4K Goatse inside. Warn them the contents are horrors beyond mortal imagining, then wait for them to open it anyway.
That's how a man would handle simulating unknowable, indescribable eldritch horror.

 

[Stare Man]

Question for you fellow tabletop Kiwis - I'm looking to get into DMing after my last group imploded. Our DM discovered FFXIV and suddenly every fight was a savage raid. This seems somewhat overwhelming, do you have any suggestions to get started, or tips for what to do/not to do?

 

[Atlictoal]

Question for you fellow tabletop Kiwis - I'm looking to get into DMing after my last group imploded. Our DM discovered FFXIV and suddenly every fight was a savage raid. This seems somewhat overwhelming, do you have any suggestions to get started, or tips for what to do/not to do?

Just start with a module, read half of it, stop, and then make the rest up as you go along at table time. Most modules have new monsters in the front or back and you can pull the rest from your monster book of choice. Now go with the same ancient wisdom all DMs did before you

 

[Raoul_Duke]

Question for you fellow tabletop Kiwis - I'm looking to get into DMing after my last group imploded. Our DM discovered FFXIV and suddenly every fight was a savage raid. This seems somewhat overwhelming, do you have any suggestions to get started, or tips for what to do/not to do?

Depends on what system and genre you want to do, as anything. But generally? Just try to make it fun for everyone, especially yourself. My motto.

 

[AnOminous]

If your players want to see what's inside the folder, hand them a manilla folder with a 8x11 glossy AI-upscaled 4K Goatse inside. Warn them the contents are horrors beyond mortal imagining, then wait for them to open it anyway.
That's how a man would handle simulating unknowable, indescribable eldritch horror.

But what if they see it and say "that all you got fag?"

 

[Ghostse]

But what if they see it and say "that all you got fag?"

Then have it be pictures of missionary sex for the purposes of procreation

 

[Snekposter]

Then have it be pictures of missionary sex for the purposes of procreation

My God man. What's next after that, sweaty unprotected handholding?

 

[Ghostse]

My God man. What's next after that, sweaty unprotected handholding?

An e-ink screen that shows that the McD's Japan ad with the Trad Family

 

[King Dead]

Question for you fellow tabletop Kiwis - I'm looking to get into DMing after my last group imploded. Our DM discovered FFXIV and suddenly every fight was a savage raid. This seems somewhat overwhelming, do you have any suggestions to get started, or tips for what to do/not to do?

You already figured out one thing not to do: don't throw a bunch of shit at your players with the intention of killing them. While it can be amusing to see a TPK, it's more entertaining if it's a consequence of the party's actions and not because you set up an unwinnable scenario. For the most part, you're there to create an engaging story that your players will work through, and your goal should be for them to succeed, not fail. If they fail, it should be on them.

Communication with your players is a good skill to develop. Before you start the campaign, talk over things your players would like to do, prep them on what you will and won't allow at your table, and help them craft a party to tackle the adventure you decide on. And keep the communication going; you'll need to be able to resolve disputes, work out scheduling issues, and all other kinds of management issues. Hopefully your party will be pretty chill and this won't be an issue.

Being a good DM is about knowing how to balance prepwork and improvisation. It's good to have ideas of where the story will go, but your players can very easily throw a wrench in the works and now you have to figure out how to progress from there. It can seem like a tall order, but you'll learn how to do this over time, and again, if your party is chill then they won't mind some hiccups. If you get really good at it, they won't be able to figure out where the prepared material stops and the improv begins.

Most importantly, have fun with it! Tabletop is a game at the end of the day, and it should be fun for both you and your players. The sky's the limit with what you can do, and since you're on the other side of the DM screen, you get even more freedom. Take advantage of that and do something crazy. If nothing else, it'll make for a good story.

 

[Stare Man]

Thanks for the suggestions! Yeah, the campaign was a mega homebrew that we were having fun with, but after the FFXIV discovery it turned into a complete on rails experience. Imagine FFX at the beginning where you need specific characters to fight specific enemies but you can't switch characters. Sometimes we'd just get FUCK YOU'D with a mechanic that another person who wasn't there could handle. He wanted a difficult experience, but he also wanted completely opaque boss mechanics with almost no adaptability on our part. It was just an utterly baffling set of decisions.

 

[Scream Aim Fire]

So, rather idiotic issue here, but...

I've been having a bit of trouble figuring out a campaign idea for World of Darkness; more specifically, 5th Edition. The idea for the campaign was going to be about a group of just regular average people from the American south - i.e., the WoD Discord's worst nightmare - getting involved in the supernatural and becoming a team of expert Hunters. The idea of the story was for the group to go from just basic cannon fodder to a survivalist militia capable of standing against even really powerful monsters. Potentially even getting assistance from similar woke-hated groups like the Second Inquisition and the Gets of Fenris.

Basically, the idea was to take the 5th Edition games, and see if we could squeeze any fun out of them. Problem is, I'm not entirely sure on where we could really go with this campaign; it would be easy to just have our crew go full murderhobo against woke stereotypes, but running a campaign that is designed entirely on spite is rather boring. Hence, we want to actually run a campaign that has some interesting end goals and such.

We've got the introduction hook all figured out; a small group of people from a small town in the south have survived an attack from a group of monsters - either a pack of Anarchs or Red Talons, we're still unsure - and have banned together to survive. The idea was, to take this group of random unlucky joes, and turn them into something of a militia; separate but still allying themselves with larger groups when needed, and generally trying to find a place to bunker down, while also eliminating various supernaturals that control the world. However, the question of where our group should be bunking down at - or whether or not we should instead be completely nomadic - is something we're still wondering.

Furthermore, we're having trouble figuring out what our starter sessions should be aiming for. For the most part, we are going to start by tracking down and killing the rest of the monster group that attacked the PCs, but where should we go from there? We've got a few story hooks to work towards, but they were intended for later in the campaign:

Spoiler: Mid-to-Late-Game Suggestions

- One idea that my group had would be for us to fight through an entire city controlled by various monster factions. The idea was, that the different kinds of supernaturals are all engaged in a shadow war in this one locked-down city, with our group either breaching or getting stuck in the area as the fighting starts. From there, we would need to figure out how to deal with the various monsters while staying alive.

- Another story hook is artifact collection; we got the idea for our group to be looting various artifacts and weapons that we get along the way. Granted, what we're going to be picking up is still a mystery...

- One of my group is really, REALLY wanting to get a boss fight against a dragon, of all things; either a Bygone from Mage, some kind of Changeling, or even a Demon. No idea why, but the idea of this drunken backwoods redneck shooting a dragon does sound fun, admittedly.

- Another idea that we had was investigating an old doomsday cult's compound located in Florida, of all places; it was based on an old sci-fi dystopia book I read back in the early 2000s. Not quite sure which supernatural we could have here as of yet, granted, but I've got some ideas.

- Yet another involves investigating an old town located up north, out near Seattle, Washington; previously the den of a serial killer, now haunted by the ghosts of his numerous victims.

However, I'm just stuck trying to figure out how our group could go from "eliminating a local group of monsters" to one or more of the above ideas. Does anyone have any suggestions for where my group could/should go and try to do after eliminating this local group of monsters? Any tips, suggestions, etc.? I'd appreciate it.

 

[Henri Barbusse]

But what if they see it and say "that all you got fag?"

It's 2023 and seeing goatse is like visiting home and getting to eat your mom's home cooking after you've been working abroad for a decade.

 

[BlazikenLover]

I was watching some lore videos and a goddess whose name I wasn't familiar with came up, googled it and 4e wikis came up revealing it was an original deity from the nentir vale setting. I kept reading and was a little confused since I thought nentir vale was supposed to be a place they shoehorned into the forgotten realms or at least the gods and the whole dawn war part.
So for those who played or at least paid attention to 4e back in the day, did people like that setting or was it hated?

 

[Snekposter]

However, I'm just stuck trying to figure out how our group could go from "eliminating a local group of monsters" to one or more of the above ideas. Does anyone have any suggestions for where my group could/should go and try to do after eliminating this local group of monsters? Any tips, suggestions, etc.? I'd appreciate it.

Have you considered reading the Monster Hunter International books for inspiration? TL;DR a bunch of good ol' Southern boys decide to do the most American thing possible with their monster hunting skills: start a business. And it means there's a piss-easy way to have them do any or all of the above: someone hired them.

 

[AnOminous]

Question for you fellow tabletop Kiwis - I'm looking to get into DMing after my last group imploded. Our DM discovered FFXIV and suddenly every fight was a savage raid. This seems somewhat overwhelming, do you have any suggestions to get started, or tips for what to do/not to do?

I just looked back to a 20+ year old campaign that was the last time I actually did GM.

The party consisted of:
an accountant (actually the most important party member and an NPC)
a professor of classics whose main skill was knowing Latin
a really rich guy who became horrified by the imminent end of the world (but had lots of money)
a weird cultist with very little remaining sanity but lots of knowledge of eldritch lore
a deranged maniac with LOTS of connections to Russian organized crime and plenty of guns

Note: the accountant was the one essential member of the party. CoC baby.

 

[Agent of Z.O.G.]

So I've been reading through Delta Green: God's Teeth after hearing about how heckin gross and ick it is. And feeling quite intrigued because of that. And I feel very underwhelmed. The DTRPG page, synopsis for the book, and the first page of the book warn about how this is so off putting and grimdark and needs all these trigger warnings. Which makes out the book to be the second coming of FATAL. But actually reading the book, you are constantly presented with the psychological horror version of a cock tease. Let me explain.

But it does Name and Describe the real horror of the adventure

Spoiler: It's....

DONALD TRUMP​

 

[AnOminous]

Then have it be pictures of missionary sex for the purposes of procreation

You sick freak.

 

[Ghostse]

I was watching some lore videos and a goddess whose name I wasn't familiar with came up, googled it and 4e wikis came up revealing it was an original deity from the nentir vale setting. I kept reading and was a little confused since I thought nentir vale was supposed to be a place they shoehorned into the forgotten realms or at least the gods and the whole dawn war part.
So for those who played or at least paid attention to 4e back in the day, did people like that setting or was it hated?

Which Goddess? It it Zehir's daughter?

Nentir Vale is generally regarded, in places I've been through, as a decent enough Sandbox for a party to grow up to lvl 10 and with enough plot hooks to give a high level party a reason to make a cameo visit. Its not an end-all-be-all but you've got space to put in nearly anything you want and there are lots of "That farway place" for external elements to go.

I'm trying to remember but I believe Nentir was an attempt to both de-prioritize Forgotten Realms ("these adventures are compatible with FR" vs. "These adventures take place in FR") while having a starting region you could also lift-and-drop into nearly any fantasy realm from Grey Hawk to Dragonlance to Mystara. So they had started to branch and do their own thing a bit.

Later in the 4e run they switched to focus on Sigil as the "default starter" location. Which given 4e works best when the party are a bunch of fanasty superheroes who just show up at the fight given how rotten the system is with magical items, that was not the worst idea.

 

[BlazikenLover]

Which Goddess? It it Zehir's daughter?

Lakal actually, part of the reason I got googling was this bit where the other gods used her remains to create a barrier against the far realm, but couldn't find anything on that.
Thanks for the answer, I got more or less the impression that nentir vale made for a good sandbox/starting point for DMs yet at the same time the bits about settlements being slow to communicate and the lack of kingdoms/states made me think "this must have nagged lore autists to no end" although I get it, adding kingdoms with defined borders to your open ended setting goes against the idea