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Post by clownboss on Mar 2, 2019 6:40:44 GMT -6
People reduce dragon's breath damage as it loses HP? What???
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Post by clownboss on Feb 1, 2019 11:54:52 GMT -6
Back when I was a wee lad, I used to rely on that video, but now I think it really shows how new he was to the wargaming mentality. Now I think I have a fair grasp of the game thanks to Gronan's many, many annecdotes, examples, and lashings of how things were done "back in the day", but not before I made my own set of embarrassing conclusions.
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Post by clownboss on Feb 1, 2019 11:45:04 GMT -6
I've been watching Extra Credits throughout many years, and that includes from the very beginning Extra History. It's really great in that way that it shines on specific events and people that would normally be obscured in a Western, Anglo-centric world, and there's always useful stuff to learn there. But at the same time I'm a bit disilusioned with series creator James Portnow, now a noted abuser who's been bullying his Extra Credits crew. And I can't help but feel like most of the newer series tend to increasingly commodify their subjects and banalise them. They tend to rely on jokes and memes a lot nowadays, as opposed to five years ago. It's a strange, love-hate relationship. Narrator Dan Floyd was just the greatest, though.
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Post by clownboss on Jan 26, 2019 18:10:03 GMT -6
Boy Gronan, you really know how to sell a book. I should check it out one day. It looks like it would answer, far, far more questions than I could ever imagine having.
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Post by clownboss on Jan 13, 2019 11:20:45 GMT -6
The point is to get a Halfling to shoot three times in two turns, right? I gamify it.
When a Halfling in my game tries to make a range attack, I tell him to flip a coin, heads or tails. Heads means he gets an extra ranged attack.
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Post by clownboss on Jan 13, 2019 10:52:08 GMT -6
Yeah man, knock yourself out.
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Post by clownboss on Oct 14, 2018 4:42:07 GMT -6
I never read those as minus. It follows the laws of nature to have more dice when your strong units fight increasingly weaker units, I reckoned.
Heavy Horse taking away 4 dice when playing against Light Foot can only happen in Bizarro World. Visualise your game as you read.
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Post by clownboss on Oct 1, 2018 4:42:27 GMT -6
A source of frustration in later editions when I'm playing a character is that I always tell my team "Guys we gotta do Swiss pikemen, get some spears", but they all stick to swords and axes, and look at me like I'm crazy.
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Post by clownboss on Sept 29, 2018 15:14:32 GMT -6
Yep, Grodog, I've seen that page before. Fantastic job on that
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Post by clownboss on Sept 28, 2018 4:19:56 GMT -6
Fantastic disclosure of the thought process Gary had making these. I sure do wish there were proper scans of all of his old Grayhawk maps, though.
From what I've gathered, it seems all of these dungeon levels are based in a mesh of 38 x 51 squares, making a kind of "outer border" for the levels. Just a note.
Also is it me or are some rooms repeated in the contents/monsters they have? Because I see many rooms have identical numbers assigned to them.
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Post by clownboss on Sept 8, 2018 4:05:23 GMT -6
My whole party, regardless of composition, encumbrance or bearings, moves 120 feet in 10 minutes when mapping. They could be the most loaded or lightest party in the world, they will always move 120ft. When revisiting explored corridors, they move 240 feet per 10 minutes, also regardless of composition and encumbrance. They move slowly because the party is guarded, deliberate, always watching, always careful, and dungeons are dark and foreboding. In flight situations things are different, because time stops being measured in 10-minute turns, but in one-minute rounds. There I measure each party member by himself because they might all vary in physical traits, encumberance, and so on, and a regular unarmored man can walk 120 feet per minute. He flees at double that rate, so 240 feet per minute. If the entire party flees, it runs at the speed of the slowest party memeber out of solidarity(unless someone deliberately wants to ditch their comrades), but they will also likely leave many of their bearings behind, like their traveling donkey, any large or heavy objects that require too much coordination to carry, such as chests or 10' poles, etc.
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Post by clownboss on Sept 6, 2018 3:18:14 GMT -6
Bootleg print. Sorry.
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Post by clownboss on Jul 27, 2018 5:41:06 GMT -6
You'll pick somebody's eye out with that!
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Post by clownboss on Jun 23, 2018 3:13:05 GMT -6
I've been just sporadically following this conversation on-and-off and frankly I don't know what the current talk is about. All I know is I want the videos to be encyclopediac and follow chronology first, and the rulebooks second, basically, and explain the surrounding culture of the time only once it's necessary. I haven't given throught to chapters. If I were to make it, they would basically be:
1. Base Chainmail rules 2. Distinctions between historical factions - pulling from the history books Gary liked 3. Examples of play and how Chainmail fits within the narrative of wargaming history 4. Fantasy supplement in Chainmail - the precursor of D&D 5. D&D Vol 1 6. D&D Vol 2 7. D&D Vol 3, all three peppered with plenty of annecdotes from Arneson's and Gary's campaigns to illustrate how the rules were implemented. Monsters will also have explanations within a cultural context. e.g. what are Orcs, how did Tolkien create them, how big was Tolkien in the 60s and 70s? 8. Later developments and D&D post-publication, public reception, you could leave space for supplements and third parties if you wish to make future episodes
Just like in every narrative production, you just need a script written in Word or whatever else, and one savvy editor(usually the same person) to read from it, understand the subject matter, and pull material(what we like to call the images and video feeds pertaining to the subject) from everywhere. If you're outsourcing the script and material to an editor who has no clue about the subject matter, you need to give pedantic leads and additional explanations to the editor through the script, or else both of you are going to have a hard time. What I'm saying is basically, the more people you distribute work duties to, the less they share the grand "mindspace".
And you need someone with a relatively good voice and sound equipment to record narration and explanations.
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Post by clownboss on Jun 17, 2018 5:56:04 GMT -6
I love this idea, as someone who's a video editor and who has a lot of faith in YT as a learning platform. If I were to make it, I'd make it about OD&D as detached from any future context - little to no references made to future editions because they do not exist(yet), I want to talk about what D&D and the culture surrounding it was like at the moment of creation in 1971-1974. It was a world before role-playing games even existed, and "tabletop gaming" meant Avalon Hill games. I figure 90% of the stuff it cites would be from Gronan's experiences
It has to start with Chainmail, though. I can not fathom how you can explain OD&D to people without the context of Chainmail.
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Post by clownboss on Jun 15, 2018 1:48:16 GMT -6
"Assume that each side has a baggage camp just behind their base line or point of entry onto the table."
Ah, look at that, they've thought about it.
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Post by clownboss on Jun 14, 2018 2:57:15 GMT -6
What if I placed my baggage right in the middle of my opponent's starting point?
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Post by clownboss on Jun 13, 2018 0:01:09 GMT -6
I don't bother with capping humans. I know my players will never reach levels such as 10-20. The experience-gaining system is simply against them.
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Post by clownboss on Jun 7, 2018 4:25:31 GMT -6
One lead I always thought pertained to troop composition of Orcs was the way Orcish Men-at-Arms could be employed in volume III. At least by it, you could easily deduce Orcs only divide into Light Foot, Heavy Foot and Archers.
Elves, on the other hand, divide into HF and Archers, exactly as their composition type is stated in Volume II.
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Post by clownboss on May 31, 2018 22:33:16 GMT -6
I've gotten used to OD&D's armor class. Now for me 3 is synonymous with 'Plate', and 6 with 'Leather+Shield'.
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Post by clownboss on May 23, 2018 1:03:06 GMT -6
Have a wizard push them in or mail them an evil artifact, then they'll think about it.
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Post by clownboss on May 22, 2018 5:59:54 GMT -6
Section F, Room 5 talks about a Cave Troll who has, among other items, a gem that summons the "Lord of Undead", except the party can not have control over him. Who or what is this being? He is not mentioned anywhere else in the module, unless they mean the Lich from the same section.
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Post by clownboss on Apr 28, 2018 3:10:35 GMT -6
They way I understood it, yeah, you go to a graveyard, cast the spell, and get a retinue of undead servants. Long deceased and decomposed bodies become Skeletons, fresh bodies become Zombies.
Lawful Clerics can't do it because it's unholy, and there would be no comparable Lawful counterpart to the Chaotic spell ability. Besides it is mages who are the NECROMANCERS.
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Post by clownboss on Apr 28, 2018 3:04:51 GMT -6
The Turks referred to in CHAINMAIL are most definitely Ottomans, I would venture circa 1300-1600 when their Balkan conquests were at their peak. Takes 500 years of adversity to know one.
Likewise I also am wondering why they're listed as Heavy Foot because I mainly know the Ottomans as wearing light armour, although that might be more true for the late-age gunpowder using ones. It must be during the Battle of Kosovo in 1389 that they must have had more heavily armed soldiers with melee weapons.
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Post by clownboss on Mar 25, 2018 5:06:20 GMT -6
I think of a case-by-case basis. If a bandit or other person seems sickly or craven to my eyes, it would be easy to give damage to him of 1-2 damage per hit. Stronger people can be subdued and knocked unconscious. A bear or ogre can't be punched to unconsciousness - Not unless your character has Strength of 17 or 18, which is probably not the case. It might be easier once you become a Superhero
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Post by clownboss on Mar 15, 2018 17:53:26 GMT -6
Me, me, me, me, I wanna play! Skype or Discord are both great. I wouldn't have anything against roll20, but the philosophy of OD&D does not lend itself to objective graphical representation. I am quite eager to draw maps myself.
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Post by clownboss on Feb 24, 2018 7:14:37 GMT -6
Oh how I wish I wasn't thousands of miles away so I could see Mike lead Chainmail and OD&D the way they're meant to be. Hope you have a great time. Can I ask what the troop compositions will be like for both Chainmail matches? And in the OD&D game, does everybody start as level 1?
Also, the thought of there being a real OD&D game being lead by Mike through Skype or Discord gets me giddy with excitement. I would love to be a part of it and learn from the real masters!
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Post by clownboss on Jan 12, 2018 7:39:33 GMT -6
Having not read AD&D material yet I struggle to grasp the equivalency of kobolds and hobgoblins in other stories. LOTR supplied the imagery for Goblins and Orcs fair enough.
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Post by clownboss on Dec 11, 2017 10:10:48 GMT -6
(Sike! It's counterfeit!)
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Post by clownboss on Dec 11, 2017 10:08:57 GMT -6
I measure every action, from disarming and looting a chest, interviewing captives, scouting ahead, etc in 10 minute chunks. I always keep a tiny notepad at the ready with segments where I write: 7:00 7:10 - Lantern started 7:20 - Battle started 7:21 7:22 7:23 7:33 7:43
And so on. That includes finding chests with more than 100 coins. I just say "You have a very heavy chest in your hands that's full of coins, but you don't know how many." They usually don't count the money either until they get back to town.
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