I am awake

I'm fucking dying someone please make a Pink Panther-style crime comedy about this

O sapo-de-chifres ou sapo-folha (Proceratophrys boiei) é uma espécie de anfíbio da família Odontophrynidae. Essa espécie é endêmica do Brasil e é encontrada em várias regiões do país. Sua distribuição inclui principalmente áreas de Mata Atlântica, que é um bioma caracterizado por florestas tropicais úmidas e diversidade biológica excepcional

I had no idea the entire horns closed as the eyelids oh my god

dorfs

everyone abstaining from voting or voting third party because both main candidates are awful are absolutely losing the plot i'm sorry. the two party system is so horribly huge that if you don't vote blue you're basically voting for trump, and it might not seem like it matters when both him and kamala are horrible, it really does. which one do you think will be easier to organize for a better country under: the one who's openly trying to lock the country into a totalitarian regime where as many minorities' rights as possible are stripped away, or the one that is still awful but with a much subtler impact?

under kamala there is a much greater chance we can rise up together and put a stop to israel's genocidal rampage. under trump we will be crushed like bugs. you do not have to support kamala to understand which one is the more survivable choice.

For weird dice wednesday, I present to you, the dUltimate die.For when you friend forgets their dice and asks to borrow a set.

Being into indie ttrpgs on Tumblr is a very funny experience because while you're ambiently considering designing a little game about idk, gremlins growing cabbages or whatever there are people who built this hobby from the ground up with 15 award winning published games and three podcasts and a knighthood from a small European monarchy just doing their thing on the same platform. Imagine this was the case for any other hobby. You go to shoot some hoops behind your house and LeBron James is just there

Here’s how you play Dungeons & Dragons: you are presented with a situation. You have three options.

Riddle me this, dungeoneers: which one of these is “can I roll an Arcana* check?”

*could be any check, really

hrm a riddle... dungeonmaster can I roll History or something to solve it?

One moment your head is on your shoulders, as it should be. The next, a fountain of blood as you come to grips with your new decapitated lifestyle.

It's 3.

The correct answer is “none of the above.” Saying you want to roll a check is not stating an action, and asking if you can isn’t asking about the situation. They’re also not doing nothing because that usually means you let someone else handle things.

If my answer is “what do you mean?” then you haven’t actually asked me a question about the situation yet, you’re just making me jump through extra hoops to get something concrete out of you.

Your original example was: "can I roll an Arcana* check?" That is a clarifying question about how the rules apply to the described situation. Players ask those kinds of questions sometimes when they want to engage mechanics or maybe even roll dice because it's fun to do.

"How the rules apply to the described situation" means nothing. Let's say I use an example situation from an earlier post.

There's a glowing rune floating in the middle of the room.

"Can I roll an Arcana check?" means nothing to me at this point. Do you want to study the rune somehow? Then say you're doing that. Do you want to know something more specific like what colour the rune is? Then ask that question.

"To engage mechanics?" There are no mechanics inherent to an Arcana check so asking for one doesn't actually do that. "To roll dice because it's fun to do?" Go play Yahtzee.

Mmm, you're not really engaging with what I'm saying in good faith. That's ok. I will state for the audience that discouraging players from communicating with the GM (however poorly they go about it) about how mechanics work and interact with the fiction doesn't actually lead to a better game for them, just a potentially more confusing and unpredictable one. That's my actual point, which you are completely missing in favor of painting my words with the dumbest brush possible. For the record, I would certainly rather play yahtzee than be a player in one of your games based on this conversation. I think we've reached the end of productive dialog here. I'm turning my notifications off. Nice talking to you and have fun playing rpgs!

Here’s how you play Dungeons & Dragons: you are presented with a situation. You have three options.

Riddle me this, dungeoneers: which one of these is “can I roll an Arcana* check?”

*could be any check, really

hrm a riddle... dungeonmaster can I roll History or something to solve it?

One moment your head is on your shoulders, as it should be. The next, a fountain of blood as you come to grips with your new decapitated lifestyle.

It's 3.

The correct answer is “none of the above.” Saying you want to roll a check is not stating an action, and asking if you can isn’t asking about the situation. They’re also not doing nothing because that usually means you let someone else handle things.

If my answer is “what do you mean?” then you haven’t actually asked me a question about the situation yet, you’re just making me jump through extra hoops to get something concrete out of you.

Your original example was: "can I roll an Arcana* check?" That is a clarifying question about how the rules apply to the described situation. Players ask those kinds of questions sometimes when they want to engage mechanics or maybe even roll dice because it's fun to do.

Here’s how you play Dungeons & Dragons: you are presented with a situation. You have three options.

Riddle me this, dungeoneers: which one of these is “can I roll an Arcana* check?”

*could be any check, really

hrm a riddle... dungeonmaster can I roll History or something to solve it?

One moment your head is on your shoulders, as it should be. The next, a fountain of blood as you come to grips with your new decapitated lifestyle.

It's 3.

My controversial game design opinion is that "environmental storytelling" should be actually, tangibly present within the game's environments. Hitting the player with a paragraph of lore every time they click on a random item in their inventory is not environmental storytelling – it's just hiding an epistolary novel in your game's UI.

"But the presence of that paragraph of lore is diegetically justified because the toilet skeleton is holding a letter" buddy, what do you think the word "epistolary" means?

"Our game has great environmental storytelling!"

Look inside

"OH NO THE BLOOD MONSTER" written on the wall

It's environmental storytelling because "OH NO THE BLOOD MONSTER" is written in blood.

Dear Inhabitants of Indie TTRPG Tumblr, may I bring to your attention the fantastic interview @monsterfactoryfanfic gave on the new Talk of the Table episode.

I want to take this interview and put it in a time capsule because this feels like such an accurate and interesting depiction of what's happening in indie TTRPGs at this specific point in time.

I spend so much time listening to these podcasts with all these brilliant designers overflowing with wisdom, and when you hear all the games and designers mentioned in this interview, all the touchstones being discussed and compared, it really feels like a perspective on this design space that understands so many of the different ways it takes shape right now.

TTRPG tumblr gets a shout out 10 mins in, along with heaps of recommendations that are obscure even here, all flowing in and out of the same conversation as the most notable names, games and ideas in the scene today.

Cant recommend it enough, go listen to it multiple times because theres so much to learn in there.

This is why I'm so enthusiastic about indie TTRPGs all the time, we're surrounded by extremely thoughtful and skilled people making some of the coolest stuff I've ever seen, and hearing someone talk about it in such a comprehensive and insightful way is an absolute treat.

Hell yeah.

Isometric Systems in Isotropic Space. Map Projection: Snail, by Ágnes Dénes, 1974

how about instead of responding to the achingly inane innovations being pushed of AI that will write your emails so that another AI can read them and provide a summary to the person you're emailing by defending the sacred art of emailing we instead stop to consider what kind of systems we have created in which people are constantly sending emails so worthless that getting an idiot robot to both read and write them seems like a sensible value proposition

"Does Evan Kelmp carry a grenade?"

"I don't know. Will you let me?"

the only number is 0 and the only math is +1 and this system DOES work for EVERYthing and if i’m wrong i will PERSONALLY eat my hat