Tabletop Gaming

I played several games with a group of friends and we now have biweekly meetups to play a few rounds of Blood on the Clocktower. I was wondering if anyone else played it?

It's a social deduction game with the same idea as Mafia/Werewolf or Town of Salem where all the players are either on the good team or the evil team. The good team has to find who's on the evil team by sharing information. The evil team consists of one Demon and at least one Minion (depending on player count). The goal is for the good team to find and execute the Demon, while the evil team has to try to convince the town that they're good.

What I like about it is that each player has their own unique role. There are a bunch of different roles with different abilities, whether it be getting information or having the ability to do something. There are even roles for different demons and minions with their own abilities. You're also allowed to go into private discussions, and dead players still play a part in the game. Dead players can still talk to other players and they have a dead vote that they can use to vote someone else (although if you use your dead vote, you lose it). I also like that you can talk during the night, although we have a house rule that you're not allowed to talk about the game during the night out loud (if we're playing online we're allowed to use text chat).

There's also so many custom scripts that combine all sorts of roles, including experimental ones that are released every month but aren't in the official scripts.

Does anyone else enjoy Blood on the Clocktower?

I have been trying to get my partner into Pathfinder 2nd edition, and they do seem taken with it, however he's been having some issues lately with PF2E. Notably, online. The more he gets into PF2E, the more hate he sees for 5E. He's been playing 5E for years now and has invested a lot of time and love into the game, and to see it bad-mouthed online by a ton of people either because they think PF2E is better, or they don't like the system, or because of the company that manages it, has been disheartening to him as of late.

He told me today that he might just stop playing altogether after he's finished with his games because of the hate he's been seeing online, and I would hate for him to drop something he loves and has invested so much time into because of some online hate comments coming from another community in an act of internet tribalism.

I tried telling him that people disliked D&D4E when it came out for various reasons, yet people still play it today, and that when I started playing 5E, 4E had the reputation of being the game that everyone hates, but he's still focused on how people will bad-mouth 5E when they really have no need to. One example I can remember him seeing (and before I bring it up, I understand Reddit's culture, but the large amount of forum posts are going to be on Reddit, especially for a large and insular hobby like TTRPGs) was on a Reddit thread of someone asking what an analogous spell or ability would be to some spell in 5E and one person commented something to the effect of "well, you could try using this spell/ability, but you won't get the same effect as you would in 5E because 5E is just for auto-win stuff that doesn't have the player trying hard" (moderately paraphrasing, but I think my point is conveyed well here).

Personally, I like PF2E over 5E, but I'll still play both, mostly because most people will play 5E and not want to try and learn a new system, especially if it's one that has a reputation of having exponentially more rules than the one they already know and are comfortable with. Does anyone have any tips for how I can help my partner here?

Hello, I've been working on this TTRPG since I played my first TTRPG years ago. My goal for it is to be fun with some resource management, very sandboxy, and accessible to new TTRPG players.

I have a 1-shot prepared, but havent had a chance to run it yet. I would also like to start a campaign that lasts a while where we can develop the rules together through playtesting.

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/33546668

I have created a free tool for players to roll dice, saving the history of all rolls, and requiring no login: simply pass a unique URL back and forth between players as rolls are made.

You can start with the empty page here, or take a look at the code to make it yourself (it's simple HTML with a tiny bit of JavaScript).

In most countries it will be probably DnD. But in mine (Poland) for many years Warhammer Fantasy was THE RPG. Nowadays it is more equal. Other popular games are Call of Cthulhu and World of Darkness line. I see that recently Shadows of the Demon Lord gains popularity. There is also quite alive indie scene. We have some bigger, commercial Polish RPGs (like Monastyr, Neuroshima, Wolsung), but nowadays they are rather not played.

Star Wars: Unlimited is filling the MtG hole after I got fed up with their mismanagement of the game.

Out of 250 rolls 27 were 1's. A roughly 11% chance of rolling a 1 on this die.

For those curious about the rest:

Hello, im a new GM and im looking for places to get digital battlemaps. Im looking for ones that are compatible with roll20.

So, it seems like after FFG lost Star Wars: Armada to Atomic Mass Games (both studios under Asmodee) and fired the responsible heads in the process, said heads switched sides to the other "Star" sci fi franchise and were busy doing something similar with warp cores and glowing nacelles. It's supposed to be released in a few weeks and can be preordered.

First impressions are available already ( https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=yLPi9N7-0I0 , https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tjBILyzBZ5Q , https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gIOyB9ZXn8s ). Let's see how well the universe of politics, ethical dilemmas and people that turn into lizards if they move too fast translates into a miniatures tabletop game.

So, I have some epic scale Eldar lying around that I'd like to give a shot. And as I liked the design of the Eldar tanks, I got too many tanks, but thankfully there's a tank craftworld (Yme-Loc) with rules.

But... There are too many rules!

There's rules that were used for epic UK tournaments at http://epic-uk.co.uk/wp/army-lists/

There's another list over at taccomms: https://www.tacticalwargames.net/taccmd/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=31593

And there's even another tank heavy list there, at https://www.tacticalwargames.net/taccmd/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=23411 , although that's "Craftworld Mymeara", for whatever reason.

... Aaaand there's a list in the army builder: https://adam77.github.io/snapfire/war/chooser.html?list=EL_ymeloc_EPICUK (which seems to be the epic UK version, but a different version).

Does anybody know which one to take? I'd like to paint some units firsts that I'm then actually going to use instead of painting all guardians first just to not fields them, so coming up with a small list would really be my first step. I'm inclined to use the army builder one, just because it's easy to use.

"We are not ready to share quite yet, but our next Brass sequel is our current top priority for development in 2024. It is slated to be our next Kickstarter, which we plan to launch Q4 2024. The exact launch date will depend on rate of development and testing. Thanks for your patience!" - Gavan Brown

the next Brass sequel is still happening, planned to launch on Kickstarter in Q4 2024 earliest.

Other Unanswered Questions at time of posting

• will Martin Wallace be involved?
• will it have a solo mode?
• will it be like the 2-player fan made Brass variant Brass: Amsterdam?
• which city would it be?

So, having recently gotten Star Wars: Armada, my son got hooked on it about as much as me, so we've been playing a few games over the past two weeks.

Today, we played our first 400 points game. I played Rebels: an mc75 ordnance cruiser, an mc30 scout frigate, a cr90a, a CR90b and the four x wings from the base game. He played Imperials with an ISD1 and carrier upgrades, an Interdictor with the two upgrades that could slow down nearby vessels and that created that speed-zero-zone when placing ships and lots of squadrons.

This was our initial setup. I navigated the cr90s quickly over to the the two mcs, the isd got stuck in the asteroids and the two mcs destroyed the Interdictor in turns three and four.

Here's the deal though... After that happened, I quickly glanced at his cards, figured I had a comfortable lead over him and simply left. Turns four and five were essentially just me stepping on the gas and getting away from his isd.

The whole game felt just so... I dunno, boring? Anticlimatic? It was one turn ramp up, one and a half turns of space battle and finally three and a half turns escaping and no fighting.

Is that really how the game turns out? Are we missing something? Forgetting something?

Mirror, in case you hit a paywall: https://archive.is/iCYt4

So, pretty much title.

A shop in Germany had a pretty good deal on some selected Armada packs and the game seemed like exactly my kind of vibe (big ships, slow movement that you need to plan ahead for, Star Wars from the 80s), so I just said eff it and treated me some Christmas presents. The order isn't even on its way yet, but I'm eager to try it over Christmas with my oldest. The point is that I have no idea about the game (beyond some rules videos I watched) and pretty much just bought what was on sale, so I probably ended up buying stuff you don't really need and am probably lacking some expansions that are considered essential. Also, I'd like to avoid frustration for my son and me, so if you have any advice on how to create more or less even armies with what I ordered, I'd be super grateful.

What I ordered is the base game, the expansion cards set, an MC30c frigate, a CR90 corvette, a nebulon b frigate, a rebel transport flotilla, an interdictor class star destroyer, an onager class star destroyer, an imperium class star destroyer, a pack of empire fighters and an MC75 cruiser. So, all in all, some larger vessels and a set of fighters for the empire and some smaller vessels for the rebels.

Does that work? Will this result in enjoyable games or was the selection that was on sale only on sale because it sucked? Any advice on how to start with what I got beyond playing the training scenario and just going with it?

I've played D&D pretty casually from time to time, but always as a player and usually just short one shots and not big campaigns.

This year I started feeling the urge to play in a big campaign, and some of my friends were showing interest. I decided why not try my hand at DMing! I went all in, I bought 6 books (DMG, PHG, Xanthars guide, tashas, MM, and MotM) a ton of paint supplies, and some tiles/maps.

And I'm glad I did! We've had four sessions so far and it's going great. We are starting on the Lost Mine of Phandelver campaign, and afterwards we will be moving into homebrew, eventually reaching level 12+. I have already started changing a few things from LMoP to fit the homebrew campaign I am planning where the BBeG will be Atropus and its chosen Warlock who is trying to attract the elder evil to Toril.

I didn't have any experience running a campaign, or even painting, but there are so many useful resources on youtube that I feel confident I've got a handle on things!

If anyone has any tips or pointers for a first time DM I'd love to hear them! I am always willing to learn.

If anyone wants to see more of the figures I've painted, heres a couple of pics https://imgur.com/a/1SMF4jr?

Interesting new TCG, the art seems really nice.

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/9721677

I have a player in my newly starting Abomination Vaults campaign that wanted the Cursed background. As part of that, I asked them what kind of curse they would have, and they came up with/saw an idea for their curse that they liked and suggested.

Their initial suggestion would be that their PC would forever be unable to open doors, which I liked the flavor of, but based on the wording of the Cursed background, was worried that it would be too much of an ever-present mechanical obstacle. Note: This player is new to TTRPGs and PF2e, so may not understand the ramifications of mechanical limitations.

To try and match what they suggested, but expand on the curse a little bit, I suggested that they perhaps are occasionally compelled to close doors on themselves instead, which the player liked.

To make it more defined and consistent, I whipped together this curse, and would like feedback on it's implementation and overall feel.

Curse: Caspian once insulted a fey creature by enclosing it within a room, in an attempt to trap it. The fey then cursed Caspian to close doors on themselves under stressful circumstances.

When Caspian approaches or crosses a doorway under a stressful environment (this may be during exploration of a dungeon or during combat), a will save may be requested to be rolled, with a DC for Caspian's level. (Level 1 = DC 15) This may occur up to 3 times per day. [Should this be more limited?]

[Daily prep: does it reset difficulty? Maybe a refocus type activity to reset difficulty or prevent the will saves for a period?]

Outcomes:

Critical Success: Caspian overcomes the desire to close the door, and no new will saves must be made for the remainder of the day

Success: Caspian overcomes the desire to close the door, but the DC for the next will save is increased by one difficulty level. [maybe should be a +2 each time?]

Failure: Caspian is unable to resist, and must spend an action [should this be a free action only for curse? opening doors takes actions too] to close the door in front of, or behind them, [figure out in what scenarios they close it before/after crossing] The DC difficulty modifier is then reset.

Critical Failure: As failure, but Caspian is unable to open the door without attempting a new will save. The DC of this will save is the basic DC difficulty, and a failure does not increase the DC difficulty.

My current thoughts for targeted input are denoted in [square brackets], but I'd like some general feedback as well. My intention is that this is an obstacle that may end up in a more dangerous circumstance, but isn't guaranteed to get them in trouble all the time.

The question about the refocus activity would be a way to prepare for the possibility of the curse, like when the players know they are about to enter a dangerous area, similar to pre-buffing.

Title

Hi all, I'm interested in some advice from folks used to facilitating board games.

So I acquired a copy of Cosmic Encounter and its Incursion expansion earlier this year. Tomorrow I'm having some folks over for dinner and board gaming so I was excited to learn the rules and see what this game was all about. I heard it's really good!

For those unaware, Cosmic Encounter is a space strategy game with a ton of potential for goofy interactions. When players have an encounter, they can choose to play cards indicating whether they want to fight or negotiate. If two players play a negotiate card, then they have a chance to exchange territory and resources.

Today I realized a potential issue in the form of a 1-minute timer during the Negotiation phase. Apparently, if two players end up in a Negotiation, they have one minute to make a deal. If they can't conclude the deal in one minute the negotiation "breaks down" and both players end up losing three of their ships.

My players love board games but I can think of at least three of them who won't like playing with a timer and will probably suggest we ignore it.

I don't want to alienate my players and I picked this because it seemed like a fun and fairly accessible experience so I would feel bad for insisting on something that made them uncomfortable.

On the other hand, I'm concerned that analysis paralysis will make the game take forever when players can take as long as they want to make deals. I've played Bullet with the same people and, since we have agreed not to use timers in that game, it can take a long time for players to finish placing their last pieces, leading to 1-2 hour games (when the playtime estimate is 15 minutes).

So I want to know what you think, especially if you have experience with Cosmic Encounter or introducing new games to people. Can we still get a good experience out of the game without using timers for a first time run? Should I recommend a compromise such as more time and/or removing the ship destruction punishment (choosing, instead, to just cancel the deal if it takes too long)?

Edit: thanks for your suggestions! I think I know how to approach this when we do play the game. Sadly we didn't end up playing it last night 🤷

So, I've been having a blast running short campaigns of this game and felt it was worth sharing with the community. While my players and I are newcomers to the OSR scene, we've found invaluable guidance in this particular book. It's packed with great advice on put together and run a rules-light, dungeon-crawling adventure. I personally appreciated the focus on being a fun playable game. If you're seeking a lighthearted 3-4 session break or aiming to introduce friends to an old school gaming experience, this book is an excellent starting point. It's easy to teach to your 5e friends and , if they are anything like my mine, they will love playing it.