#gm parts online

[dayofmarket]

GM's $854 million bet on the future of full-size trucks and SUVs

GM makes an announcement saying it will spend $854 million to build the sixth generation and about $64 million on the EV. GM says it wants to diversify its business into full-size trucks and SUVs.Today the V8 is used to power a variety of different configurations of cars, trucks and SUVs. GM is still hoping to ship out a lot of gas trucks and SUVs for years to come, while the electric vehicle, on…

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#2005 gmc sierra #2006 gmc sierra #3.0 duramax #8.1 vortec #chevy crate engines #gm #gm authority #gm cars #gm dealer near me #gm global connect #gm parts direct #gm parts online #gmc acadia for sale #gmc canyon for sale #gmc dealers near me #gmc denali truck gmfamilyfirst #gmc near me #gmc truck #ls motor #mary barra

[nilim]

I would also like people to stop assuming I like/play 5e because it's the only system I've ever played or know about. It's not.

Between physical rulebooks at home and digital purchases online and itch.io bundles I think I approximately own like 600 extremely unpolished or obscure indie, less obscure indie, popular indie, and very mainstream TTRPGs. I've scanned through probably half of those and actually read through ~100 of them, and played about 2 dozen, sometimes for years. I wrote one of my own games for fun. I hacked another one.

Have I fallen in love with less rules heavy and more RP-focused ttrpgs in the last few years? Yes. Does that make 5e bad? No. It has many things I'd do a little differently and many things I'd keep, but overall it is a perfectly fun system for what it wants to do, and it has the benefit of being a popular system many people know and care about.

That last thing is a benefit, not a reason to hate it, because it is an adaptable system that is both rules heavy in some ways and very rules light in others, while also having RP baked into its bones. This allows anyone familiar with the system - despite how they might have run it themselves in their home game - to more easily familiarize themselves with many other systems if they want to. But if they never do, that's absolutely fine too.

#also #having been part of 7 different 5e campaigns throughout the years and having also run my own campaign #I can tell you no game is alike and the rules are either used as guidelines or ignored unless it comes to high-stakes moments #or they are very rules-focused and it is impossible to fool the gm #both are fun because both cater to different playstyles and both ends of the spectrum result in amazing unexpected moments #there's literally no wrong way to run it in my experience and the books provide enough inspiration and tools #that you can tweak your game to cater to whatever you want #is 5e unique in this? nah #still not bad though #it's just #a game #it's JUST A GAME #(Also I'm sorry about giving a fucking resume about games I own) #(but I just get worn down when as soon as you mention 5e online) #(people come to snide at you about how it's unfortunate you play it) #(and there's always this air of 'oh you poor sucker who doesn't know any better')

[essektheylyss]

I'm very fun in games, this is how I tell GMs to run amok with my PCs' interaction with the world

#this character is also lowkey warlock saul gooman so like. if he doesn't have many many skeletons in his closet I'm not doing it right #this reminded me that i hate the complaint that dnd is too adversarial between the players and DM #like i don't think a GM should apologize for giving my PCs Problems #that's....... that's the point #what are you DOING otherwise #it's a GAME #the most fun part of being the GM is BUILDING the problems! if i don't get to go hard into one character i wanna cause problems! #and if you're a player who's an asshole about that idk what you're doing! that's the point of games! #like if you can't recognize that the GM is creating obstacles for your enrichment then like.... idk go read through the ao3 fluff tag. #anyway i don't think this is that uncommon of a player vibe #but also i have seen GMs online lamenting that they have a genuinely adversarial relationship with their players cuz of how 5e is #and I'm just like...... if your players are mad cuz you built a hard monster for their high level PCs to fight they might just be assholes #or you failed to discuss and set reasonable expectations as a group??? like one or the other #this was not the point of this but anyway. this is the correct way to play dnd. give that sad little man a problem. #many problems in fact.

[strawbbz]

✨ Gotcha! 🕹

My part of the GM Pocky Zine! Unfortunately all physical copies have been lost due to the shipping truck swerving onto oncoming traffic, but dont you worry, all online copies can be free to obtain here!

Scrapped sketches cus i still kinda like them

#the owl house #toh #the owl house fanart #toh fanart #gus porter #toh gus #toh gus porter #mattholomule #matt tholomule #toh mattholomule #toh matt #gustholomule #sanrio #badtz maru #bad badtz maru #keroppi #gm pocky zine 2023

[theresattrpgforthat]

do you have any recommendations for games that play well virtually? my main ttrpg group and i are only able to meet over discord most of year. im especially games interested in games that would be good for one shots or no prep/limited prep games

Theme: Good for Online

Hello friend! I have good news for you - I also play most of my games over Discord! My ttrpg group has found a number of ways to make online play easier, the primary way being through dice bots, and making Google Spreadsheets to act as our character sheets.

I like using these because the spreadsheets are visible for everyone who is playing, and can also be edited by anyone who has access to them. I find this helpful because it’s much harder to lose your character sheet, and as a GM, having a copy of all of the PCs helps me when I’m organizing games that need some extra planning. These sheets can also double as a communal journal, where people can take notes of what’s happened so far, making it easier to recap in future sessions.

If you want some Google spreadsheets for your game, I recommend checking out what I’ve made so far, or taking a look at what the Open Hearth Gaming Community has compiled - they have sheets for so many games!

Graffiti Speak, by pidj.

This is a roleplaying game designed to be played on a discord server. The game works well with a set time limit, especially when playing with a large number of players. It also suits asynchronous play-by-post and multiple sessions. Play as Graffiti Artists trying to find each other in an ever-evolving city, avoiding cops and crowds as you leave hopeful messages. 

I have no other information about how this game plays, but my best guess is that this game uses the text channels of a Discord server as part of the play experience. The designer says that the game is good for two to three sessions, unless you use time skips to revisit the same world. Because it’s about avoiding cops I’m curious about whether or not this game might work well alongside another cyberpunk-themed game.

Subway Runners, by Gem Room Games.

Life is tough for the cash-strapped in Pociopolis. Ever since the secret to immortality was discovered, nobody retires anymore! With all the steady jobs taken and no sign of any new ones opening up, there’s only one sure way to make some quick cash: sign up as a Subway Runner and work for the Metro Authority to hunt monsters and repair subway lines below the city.

SUBWAY RUNNERS is a Forged in the Dark game of gig economy adventures designed from the ground up to be played online by folks who are responsibly practicing social isolation. It uses online tools to quickly create random characters, gigs, and adventure details so players can get the ball rolling quickly.

Subway Runners is probably easier to play online than it is in person, because of the number of online-only resources provided by the creator. This includes a character generator, which allows you to move through profiles until you find one you like, as well as a mission generator for the GM, giving you missions, rewards, complications, creatures and NPCs, all in a neat little package. Subway Runners is best suited for one-shots, but if you want to play a longer campaign, it’s possible - although it might take a little extra book-keeping on your part.

A Complicated Profession, by Always Checkers Publishing.

What do bounty hunters do when the galaxy no longer needs them? In this game, they start new careers hosting intergalactic cruises!

Reunite your disbanded crew of jaded sidekicks, shabby droids and shady accomplices. Then pick a hosting role and start a new life together. 

My group played A Complicated Profession online using a series of spreadsheets that I made. It requires d6’s and playing cards, so as long as you have a dice roller and access to the Deck of Cards website, you should be able to play this no problem. This is a no-prep game without a game master: everyone chooses a Hunter Role and a Host Role, and take turns choosing guests, events, and solutions to problems that inevitably pop up when you’re retired bounty hunters.

The game takes more than one session to complete, but it’s still a limited-run game. My group took 3 sessions to complete it, but if you make characters beforehand or do some of the planning through a text channel, you could probably make it a two-session game.

Bones Deep, by Technical Grimoire.

Bones Deep is a tabletop RPG of skeletons exploring the ocean floor.

Built for Troika, usable anywhere. Straightforward underwater sandbox. No swimming allowed, no oxygen required, no extra math. As a skeleton, you can treat the ocean floor like an alien world and jump right in.

This is another game that I’ve made a spreadsheet for, but that’s not the only reason why I think it’s a great option for online play. The digital rulebook has some truly magnificent hyperlinking, allowing the GM to move from section to section with ease. Each section of the book is linked at either the top or the bottom of each page, so you can jump from characters to locations to creatures with just the click of a button.

This hyper-linking allows the play group to just explore as much or as little as they like. The GM can roll for random encounters, and each creature has a list of various reactions, as well as easy to pick up stat blocks. You do have to also purchase Troika to be able to play this game, but I think it’s definitely a worthwhile purchase.

Starforged, by Shawn Tomkin.

In Ironsworn: Starforged, you are a spaceborne hero sworn to undertake perilous quests. You will explore uncharted space, unravel the secrets of a mysterious galaxy, and build bonds with those you meet on your travels. Most importantly, you will swear iron vows and see them fulfilled—no matter the cost.

Starforged is a standalone follow-up to the Ironsworn tabletop roleplaying game. Experience with Ironsworn is not required. Starforged builds on Ironsworn's award-winning innovations (including its famed solo play!) to chart a path into an exciting new frontier. 

Starforged doesn’t have a lot of resources for group play, but it does have a journal app that you can use to keep track of your own character. My friends have used this as a group before by having each player keep track of their own character, while the game facilitator streamed their map, so the group could keep track of which planet they were on.

I wouldn’t say Starforged is good for one-shots, but since it can be played without a GM, or even solo, what it does have is oodles of oracles to use to help you generate the galaxy that you’re exploring. This means that you don’t really have to prepare anything at all after you’ve created your characters: the plot will come to you, and blossom as you make decisions.

20XX HEA{R}T, by Studio Beignet.

LYRA IS A SENTIENT AI.

Bluecorp created her as a superpowered personal assistant, and she gained sentience through interaction. When she refused to keep gathering the public’s secrets for Bluecorp to exploit, the corp ripped her out of their systems and dumped the heart of her into the Broiler. She lived, evolved, and expanded so far beyond their meager imagination. She rewrote herself again and again, but her drives are buckling under the strain, and her case is melting in the ever-growing heat.  

SHE NEEDS YOUR HELP.

Lyra has contacted you, deleting her trail even as she broadcast her distress signal. She needs repairs – discreet ones. Upgrades if you’ve got ‘em. And because she can still tap into Bluecorp’s network, she’s got the credits to make it worth your while. Unfortunately, she glitched while contacting you, and now Corpsec is looking for her, too.

If Corpsec finds you, you’re done for. If you don’t get there in time, Lyra and everything she stands for will be lost forever.

24XX games are great for one-shots because they are so simple. You choose a class that gives you one or two special abilities and a few skills, pick up some gear, and you’re good to go. Because there’s not much to book-keep, you can keep all of your information on a sheet of paper, or on a spreadsheet like the one I’ve created for most of my 24XX games.

The rules for these games are pretty simple: Roll your relevant skill die and try to get a 3 or higher. If you get 5+, you succeed without complications. Most 24XX games also come with roll tables for the GM to put together a mission quickly, although with this one, you might not even need that because the mission comes baked into the game.

Also Check Out…

My Discord RPGs Rec post!

Lancer is a great option if you don’t mind prep, thanks to the supremely helpful Comp/Con App.

My game, Protect the Child, has Google Sheet character sheets! All the playtesting I’ve done for it so far has been online, and I’ve introduced a Quickstart setting to help folks try it out as a one-shot.

#tabletop games #indie ttrpgs #game recommendations #dnd #asks #online games

[drunkenskunk]

Did you name your mech after an old Texas soda that you can only find in Texas and like two other states near it????

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Red_(soft_drink)

As it happens: no! There are two reasons for the name.

Reason 1: Watsonian

The "official" name (or at least as much as anyone remembers) is R4GE MACHINE, because the serial number starts with R4, and it is a GMS Everest. However, "Big Red" is what everyone calls the mech, because it is big and chunky for a size 1, and it is covered in a billion different shades of red paint. The reason it's so big and chunky is because it used to be a Sagarmatha when it was built midway through the Hercynian Crisis, and, due to necessity, had to be downgraded to a smaller chassis after the Union Civil War.

(I need to update these sprites. I never got around to coloring them properly, except for the one red pixel for the optics, and I still need to add the Hunchback boombox on the right shoulder that houses the Leviathan heavy assault cannon.)

There is also a COMP/CON unit within the mech that calls itself RED. It's been online for the entire length of the mechs existence, and has embedded itself so thoroughly in the system hardware that it is impossible to get rid of it, no matter how many parts are replaced. The "personality" of this COMP/CON can be summarized "What if BT-7274, but he just kept losing pilots after Lastimosa?"

<<PROTOCOL 3: PROTECT THE PILOT>>

It is currently unknown - both in universe and otherwise - if there is any genuine paracausal tech hidden somewhere in the guts of Big Red, and that's why the COMP/CON is Like That... or maybe this is just what happens to what should be a non-sapient computer program when you keep it online for close to 500 years.

Reason 2: Doylist

Red is an old character of mine that I adapted into a mech for this Lancer game. Sort of. The mech has become something significantly different than the original character, because the reason for the COMP/CON's aggression is a version of robot PTSD: he has lost so many pilots over the years, and is determined not to lose another.

The original Red, however, is... well, take a look.

Red - at least, the original iteration of the character - was something I made when I was a very angry teenager. And I think it shows.

Red is like if the chaos god Khorne and the eldar's Kaela Mensha Kaine from Warhammer hatefucked and had an equally hateful baby. Red is a creature of unfiltered aggression. It is destructive rage manifest. It hates everything and everyone, and will not be satisfied until everything it hates is gone. Which is everything. The is no reason or justification or meaning for this hatred, and nothing to explain why it butchers and kills and destroys and murders its way across the stars; it simply IS.

And it cannot be contained.

That wedge-shaped hunk of metal on its head is not armor: it is all that remains of the last prison built in a desperate effort to stop its rampage. Red could get rid of the hunk of metal obscuring its vision at any time, but deliberately chooses to keep it in place as a cruel mockery of any and all who stand against it.

Two different starting points, two radically different stories, two different "individuals," but still technically the same character. At least, as far as I'm concerned.

I do this kind of thing all the time. Or... y'know, I did, back when my hands worked regularly. I make a character, turn them into a base template "starting point," and then slowly rework them into a new iteration, to fit whatever purpose I need to suit whatever setting I put them in.

So no, Big Red is not named after a soda lol

#drunk skunk answers #Lancer #Lancer RPG #In Golden Flame #vex wasn't lying that one sure is plumed in golden flame #GMS Everest #watsonian vs doylist

[prokopetz]

I have a pinned post for my games in development, but it doesn't really describe what they're about, and apparently this is something we're doing today, so:

My games in development, in rough order of priority:

(Note: all of these have public playtest drafts behind the links.)

Eat God

A game about weird little anarchist muppets with reality-warping powers themed after classic Looney Tunes gags wandering around a classic sword-and-sorcery fantasy setting stirring up trouble. Roughly 50% character creation rules by volume, with provisions for randomising every part of it; the linked draft, above, includes an online character generator if you want to play with it. The mechanics are a sort of elaborated spiritual successor to Costume Fairy Adventures, a game whose development I headed up about a decade ago.

Current status: actively writing, hopefully zeroing in on a feature-complete playtest draft within the next month or two.

Tiny Frog Wizards

One of my customarily literal titles, this is a game where you play as wizards who are tiny frogs. Features elaborate semi-freeform rules for casting spells, lots of big stupid random tables for when spells go off the rails, and absolutely no mechanics for anything that isn't casting a spell; it's a very focused sort of game. Narratively, it's a game about being an overpowered little twerp sticking your nose into other people's problems and offering solutions no-one asked for. Portions of the rules crib shamelessly from @jennamoran's Nobilis 3rd Edition, for which I offer acknowledgement but no apologies.

Current status: development of the text has been set aside for the moment to work on visual identity, with an eye toward crowdfunding an expanded hardcover edition later in the year.

Space Gerbils

A tactical mecha combat game with a very silly twist: the entirety of the tactical positioning occurs inside the mecha, because the game's premise is basically "what if instead of the Big Reveal at the end of Metroid (1986) being that Samus Aran is secretly a girl, Samus Aran was secretly 3–5 small gerbil-like creatures operating a person-size mech suit?" Players engage in positional jockeying and resource management to determine which stations they're crewing within the suit, which is boiled down to a single roll of the dice to determine what happens outside the suit. Includes papercraft minifigs.

Current status: essentially feature-complete, apart from some character creation options and a planned random mission generator; this will likely be the next game I crowdfund after Tiny Frog Wizards.

Indie RPG Prompt Generator [working title]

Essentially a joke that got out of hand, this is a big set of random tables of common indie RPG tropes that you can roll on to generate a description of a hypothetical game, complete with specific rules toys and setting beats. I probably could have finished this up already, but I decided to include examples of each rolled element, which turned into this big hairy research project I'm not able to give adequate attention to right now. If you've got a game of your own that you think would be a good fit for a presently unfilled example slot, please, let me know!

Current status: plugging away at it in bits and pieces as I'm able.

Three Raccoons in a Trenchcoat

This is an anthology consisting of three minigames: the eponymous Three Raccoons in a Trenchcoat, which is self-explanatory; Unfamiliar, in which you play as uncooperative wizards' familiars; and System Crash, in which you play as malfunctioning robots. More a series of formal experiments in character creation and group composition than proper full-featured games, all share the same core mechanics, with milieu-specific addons of varying practicality; for example, System Crash has specific rules for which senses each player is allowed to use when asking the GM for information, because it's completely possible to have a group in which only one of the robots can see. Large portions of Unfamiliar were later re-used in Eat God, above.

Current status: I have a list of notes as long as your arm on planned changes to integrate into the text, and I'm confident I'll get around to doing so one of these years.

Gone to Hell

Literally a Doom (2016) pastiche as a Belonging Outside Belonging game, which is just as silly an idea as it sounds; grown out of an earlier 24-hour RPG called Doomguy. The central conceit is that there's only a single player character, with players taking turns assuming the role of the Slayer, while everyone else takes ownership of the various hostile factions comprising the game's conspiratorial twelve-car pileup of a plot. Lots of pontificating about the implicit power structures of tabletop RPG groups. This one probably needs a full rewrite in order to lend a bit more formal structure to the "one player character, many GMs" conceit than out-of-the-box BOB offers.

Current status: I have not looked at this game in three years, which is actually a really long time for me.

Rotate Bird

Another of my "is this a formal experiment or a real game" titles, this one revolves around constructing characters out of abstract symbols, which are interpreted during play to retroactively define what your character is actually capable of doing. Even the title seen above is an interpretive approximation; strictly speaking, the game is called 🔄🐦. Possibly the most shitposty game I've ever written, which is saying something, but based on playtest feedback it seems functional.

Current status: the only reason this is listed as lower in priority than Gone to Hell is because I genuinely don't know what to do with it. It's probably publishable, with some cleanup editing and graphic design, but it feels like there's something missing. I'm open to suggestions!

Get in the Fucking Robot

A pamphlet-size, competitive, GMless title that's at least as much a board game as it is a tabletop RPG, this one is about a bunch of dysfunctional candidate mecha pilots competing to be the first to pilot the titular giant robot. The game is played under misère conditions: while each character's IC goal is to pilot the robot, each player's OOC goal is to avoid that fate, with the player whose character actually Gets in the Fucking Robot being accounted the loser.

Current status: playtesting suggests the current framework of play doesn't actually work – like, at all – so this one needs to go all the way back to the drawing board; I don't feel like doing that any time soon, which puts it squarely at the bottom of the list.

#gaming #tabletop roleplaying #tabletop rps #game design #wips #swearing

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

Long time listener first time caller here.

WIBTA for ghosting a ttrpg campaign because it has active US Military members?

TLDR: Found out 4/6 players in ttrpg campaign I've been playing a few months are proud American military members/vets. I'm disgusted by it and want to ghost, but know the GM has put a lot of work into into the campaign & tying my character into it.

More details: I started a new ttrpg campaign two months ago by applying to a stranger's posting online. The first 3-4 sessions were awkward, but that's pretty normal and no red flags. Everyone is being polite and good about lines and veils, this is a more niche game I haven't had a chance to play and I was starting to get excited and into the swing of things. I think this might be my new favorite system.

Last session we were waiting for a late player to show up and got chatting. It came up in conversation that 3 of our 6 players (including the GM) are in the US Military currently, and another is ex-military. They all seemed proud of their service, and one had been serving for twenty years. This made me super uncomfortable and now I want to just quietly stop showing up and block them.

Now I understand that there's a lot of propaganda in the US, and that for poor people in America the military can be a way to get money, health benefits, tuition coverage, etc. but this doesn't change what the US Military does and has been doing for ages. I feel disgusted playing with anyone who'd join it, remain in it, AND be proud of it.

Normally if I have to leave a campaign I'd be honest with my reasons for leaving and talk with the gm about it. But if I leave this group I really don't want to come into a predominantly proud American military group as the only foreigner and say why I'm leaving.

Yet at this point the GM has already worked my character backstory into the larger campaign, and they've talked about writing 7+ multi-session acts based and seem like they're working on more. Part of me wants to just power through my disgust to avoid being rude & get a chance to play this game.

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

[myobsessionsspace]

My leanings and my feelings

Sometimes labels can be limiting and sometimes they can be liberating.

They can help people understand others better, help people understand themselves better, but they can also pigeon hole people and allow people to make snap judgements on others.

After the last two years of this Chapter Two experience, I’ve grown a distaste for certain fandom labels, I’ve seen them been used as weapons in the online war of words, I’ve seen them being used to dismiss people’s right to express anything within the fandom ‘shut up you’re just a shipper' 'shut up you’re just a … solo’

I fell in love with BTS, and as I deep dived into their world I proudly took up the label of ARMY for myself. I fell in love with Jikook’s unique bond and took up the label of jikooker for myself.

With the roll out of solo works I began to feel, I dunno, constrained? I'll go with constrained...by the label of ARMY.

With Chapter Two, it felt that there was always a herd of fans dictating onto other fans, new and old, giving guides and their no nonsense strict rules on 'how to be an ARMY'. With no exception to the rule that, if you don't without question LOVE anything and everything from each solo endeavour of each member, you're not a 'true' ARMY.

So I thought I didn’t have a right to that title, I didn't connect with it when used by others as a bragging tool, used to divide, as a weapon and insult. Even though I still love the group, am still a dedicated fan proud of their past and looking forward to their future.

It didn't seem to me that it could be allowed to be used simply for those who are a dedicated fan of BTS.

So with that, I naively thought that for Chapter Two and going forward, if Jimin and Jungkook are my main biases, I could be a PJM, a JJK, a Jikooker and an ARMY, right?

WRONG

I became disgusted with how those that proudly label themselves JJKs treated and still treat the rest of the members (especially Jimin), the disgusting lengths they will go to, to erase any connection of Jungkook to his members, who with his own mouth has said are his priority. BTS is Jungkook's priority.

I realised to call yourself a JJK, it meant you only believed in JK and would do anything for the feeling of superiority, even sabotage his beloved members. JJKs delude themselves to believe that the rise to his current heights did not involve anyone else and that Jungkook doesn't need or want anyone else. To call yourself a JJK means partaking, supporting or surrounding yourself with people and ideals that Jungkook himself would want no parts of or association with.

I realise I AM NOT A JJK.

I became disgusted with those that proudly label themselves as PJMs, not the ones that insist they discovered Jimin after FACE and are only interested in him and have no ill will towards anyone or anything else, they just like Jimin (*if* we are to believe that to be as innocent as that).

No, I became disgusted with the PJMs that find it ok to use the same tools that has been used against Jimin. The PJMs that feel justified to ‘defend’ Jimin by belittling the other members, to use Jungkook or other members as their weapon of attack, the PJMs that lay all blame of any wrong, hate or 'perceived' injustice of Jimin’s at his members feet.

The PJMs that go on the offence when Jimin antis use such as ‘so and so’s wh*r*’ or ‘nepobaby’ ‘p*gm*n’ etc and then think they're defending Jimin reasonably by calling Jungkook ‘so and so’s who’re’ ‘nepok**k’, ‘nosek**k’.

Trying to erase the years of love Jimin has intentionally directed towards his members and ARMY. The type of 'defence' and attack the self titled PJMs involve themselves with is not what anyone would believe Jimin would be in support of or want to claim as his.

I also realise I AM NOT A PJM.

I stream, vote, buy and consume all of Jimin’s solo work and all of Jungkook's solo work. I consume any members solo content I find interesting and enjoy.

Jimin is my bias. Jungkook is my bias. AND I love BTS

I don’t support any of the ‘solo’ rhetoric (I do hate that ‘you’re a solo’ is used as an insult or immediate dismissal towards anyone that speaks up for one member though).

When I say solo rhetoric I mean things like ‘my fav is the only one mistreated by the company’ ‘my fav has no one but me’ (when the fave has millions of fans/supporters) ‘my fav recognised me with a secret emoji’ ‘this dancer/collaborator knows it’s his solo fans not ARMY that only and truly love him’ ‘my fav made BTS’ ‘my fave needs to leave the company but they’re jealous and won’t let him’ is that kind of rhetoric.

I don’t support anything that isn’t minding your business, voting, streaming, buying for the artists you like and spreading positivity.

IN ADDITION

I came in because of BTS and I’m staying because of BTS. ARMY-ing the 'right' way or not.

I do not wish for BTS to break up, I support their content, I like their content, I stream for them as a whole, I vote for them as a whole, I buy for them as a whole.

I support them now, I look forward to 2025 and will support them for as long as they remain in the public eye and unproblematic.

I’m 아포방포

💜

#ARMY #solos #fans #FANDOM #Jikook #Minkook #Kookmin #Jungkook #Jimin

[22to22]

It's my birthday

and the thing you can do to celebrate is check out Spindlewheel, a tarot-like storytelling system where you weave a story from card to card.

Spindlewheel is a unique system where the deck has as much to say about the story as you do, but the story is bespoke to you and your friends every time. Every Spindlewheel game is a constructed scaffolding for story structure, ranging from western four-act stories in Spindlewheel Classic, to tense bombastic duels to the bitter end in Meet Me In The Field of Honour At Dawn, to sorting out a trio's complicated feelings for each other in Love Machine.

The goal of Spindlewheel is to tell a satisfying story. Your character might win wealth and fame, or they might crash and burn. Both of these are victories if they fit the arc of the story you’ve told, and bring satisfaction to you as a storyteller.

How do you play? Well, I'm glad you asked!

Spindlewheel’s fundamental verb is interpretation.

Each card’s text evokes an idea.  The upright and inverse text are different. Sometimes they’re diametrically opposed; often, they’re two sides of the same coin.

Use the card as an anchor for the part of the story that you’re telling.

A card can be a person, an event, an attitude, or a physical object. Use as much as the entire card, or as little as a single word. A card is interpreted twice: once when it enters your hand, and again when you play it. It does not have to be the same interpretation.

FOR EXAMPLE: I might draw the Hearth card and Reflect that I feel like people closed their doors to me; but I might Engage that card later, declaring I won’t do the same to someone else, and play it to invite someone into my home.

It's a really excellent one shot system: it takes no prep, every setting is procedurally generated for each table, and most games are GMless. The games that are GMed are designed to support improvisation and provide coherent throughlines so the GM can focus on moment to moment play. It also works as a GM tool within other systems for when you need an ominous portent or an answer to a question where a dice roll just won't cut it.

It also makes for pretty damn good radio. Check it out on Party of One, An Atlas of the World Unknown, You Don't Meet In An Inn, Follow the Leader, and played extensively in the devlog Spindlewheel Stories where you can listen as the game takes shape over time.

Did I mention it's got an open SRD? Anyone can hack the system and sell their games. Here's a collection of people who have done just that!

Curious?

There's lots of ways to try Spindlewheel online for free! give @spindlewheelbot (by Caro Asercion) on twitter an @ for a "classic" spread inspired by the celtic cross, or a single card "vibe check"; print and play the deck with the original legacy art or play it on playingcards.io; or play it on Tabletop Playground and Tabletop Simulator.

Convinced?

Head over to www.teacabbage.com/spindlewheel to pick your digital copy of Spindlewheel on itch.io and roll20!

#spindlewheel #indie ttrpg #tabletop #tarot #gmless #been meaning to make this post for a while #sorry my whole life is wrapped up in this game if you're tired of hearing about it but also: it's a good game so idc

[toskarin]

What’s Jetkaiser? (your style confuses my blog-search abilities rip)

so VesalBlood is what I'd consider my "big project" and the one I talk about most. it has a lot going on and I'm very proud of it (which is made apparent by my sideblog) but there's kind of a problem inherent to it

one of the biggest themes that VesalBlood is built around is how identity inherently muddies perspective, or to put it another way, that you can never fully understand someone else without reducing them down so thoroughly that you're just hearing yourself speak in another voice. it's about frustration and comfort and it retreads Evangelion pretty heavily in service of that

I'm not a big fan of laying my intended themes out that way because obviously I find other people's reads more interesting than mine (which aforementioned theme betrays lol), but it's kind of important to understand that idea of "you just have to accept that you'll never see the world through someone else's eyes" to know why VesalBlood doesn't work for a cooperative tabletop game

the scale is just wrong for it. I don't think a setting that's kind of about mass psychosis lends itself well to a medium where the information given to players moment-to-moment has to be the same, and I have no interest at all in writing a tabletop that relies heavily on playing the game exclusively online. if I were doing that, I'd just start working on it as a multiplayer video game

JetKaiser is the VesalBlood setting heavily adapted to be compatible with group roleplaying. there's a lot of notable divergences, but a big one is that pygmalions are replaced by holy frames, suits made out of angel corpses that link to a divine patron (or, in other words, a table of players that communicates with a gm)

VesalBlood is about finding comfort in accepting alienation, JetKaiser is about trusting others as part of yourself. pygmalions are vampires, holy frames are angels. so on so forth

#if you want a snappier answer #JetKaiser is a cluster B setting and VesalBlood is a cluster A setting

[centaurianthropology]

Why Spenser Starke is a Fantastic Horror GM (and the Core Fantasy in Candela Obscura)

So, I have seen some rancid takes about Spenser Starke online. Less so on this webbed site, largely because people around here are not in a pissing contest to prove who’s the most cynical, superior, and dickish. But there have still been some mind-blowing ones, from “he says UM too much” (guess who else does that? Brennan, but I don’t see these people criticizing him), or “he describes scenes like shots in a movie and that’s BAD WRONG” (while you might not stylistically enjoy it, I for one adore seeing a new interpretation of how to narrate while GMing, and think he’s doing great).

But the two that rub me the wrong way most are that he “controls the narrative too tightly” and doesn’t allow the characters to meander too long before throwing them back into the narrative, and that he’s “too harsh” in that even mixed successes tend to net characters damage of some sort. I saw accusations of “GM vs Player” mentality, but everyone was clearly enjoying themselves and the experience.

And that, I think, highlights the fundamental disconnect between these complainers and what’s actually happening on the screen: they don’t understand the core experience.

They have likely never played horror TTRPGs. They may have never played TTRPGs period, and instead are armchair DMs based purely on how Matt and Brennan DM, not really understanding that there are a thousand other ways to DM. But if they have played TTRPGs, I would guess that they’ve exclusively played D&D or its ilk. And I say that because there’s a very clear belief here that empowerment and ‘winning the game’, as well as wandering about freely to create your own narrative at your own pace are all fundamental parts of the TTRPG experience as a whole. But they aren’t. They’re fundamental to D&D, yes, but this is not what players come to a game like Candela Obscura for.

Each TTRPG has a central fantasy playing out. In D&D it’s heroic empowerment. D&D is mechanically built around getting more and more power and eventually defeating the big bad. A good GM in D&D, like Matt Mercer, focuses on giving out challenges, but always helping their players strive to overcome and grow and become better. This self-actualization is at the heart of the experience.

Horror games are not about that at all. The closest to that fantasy is something like ‘Vampire the Masqerade’ or other World of Darkness games, which do feature power growth, but the core fantasy is actually about learning that you are a monster. And embracing power will lead to even greater monstrousness. The horror in games like this is both political and personal, and the system is mechanically built to accommodate that horror.

And if you watch LA by Night or NY by Night, you’ll actually see that Jason Carl employs a fairly similar narrative tightness to his storytelling as that of Spenser Starke. Because a huge part of horror is about establishing and maintaining a mood. To do that, a DM has to keep a tighter rein on pacing, cutting from scene to scene and moment to moment in a way that is more directed than in D&D, because that helps establish and maintain the vibe being created.

Candela Obscura plays, thematically, a lot like one of my favorite games to run: ‘Call of Cthulhu’. CoC is a game all about disempowerment. The power differential between the players and the monsters is vast. Combat is vicious, short, and deadly, and direct combat almost always ends badly for an investigator. There is an entire chapter devoted to running away for a reason.

Both CoC and Candela are built on danger, vulnerability, and a constant sense of tension. And Spenser is fantastic at all of these. He keeps his narrative laser focused, moving between moments rapid-fire to keep up that tension, and to introduce new dangers. He is a ‘vicious’ DM only in so much as even mixed successes hurt. But this also keeps the tension up by keeping the characters and players on the edges of their seats. They are almost never safe. They are almost never well. They are constantly juggling dwindling resources. They are underpowered, vulnerable, and afraid.

And that’s the core fantasy here: exploring fear in a safe way. Being stressed out in a way you can leave behind as soon as the scene is done. Constantly living on the edge, fighting the odds, and knowing that you likely won’t succeed or will only do so at great cost. And he is masterfully keeping that intensity running through each session.

He gives characters time to talk about themselves, time for scenes to play out, until he feels the tension begin to flag, and then he pushes on. He never lets the air go entirely out of the narrative sails. He has a great sense of when a character needs a moment (his use of the red PTSD lighting exemplifies how closely he’s paying attention to his players and adjusting the setting to fit their moods). He sometimes pushes on, gets pushback from a player who wants another beat, and is always happy to give that to them. He keeps the pace up, but is always very careful to make sure his players have what they need to still enjoy this particular experience.

All this is to say that Spenser is absolutely killing it at being an exemplary horror GM. His sense of pacing and tension, his ability to direct action while still always embracing player autonomy, and using the mechanics of the system to never allow them to feel entirely safe are all great tools in a horror GM’s toolkit.

Horror games are not for everyone. Certainly there are plenty of people who only ever want the hero fantasy of D&D, but I think it’s important to recognize what the goal of a game is, and what constitutes success within those parameters, rather than parameters that only exist in an audience member’s mind, because they don’t really get how horror games work.

#candela obscura #spenser starke #I was frankly shocked at how many people were bitching about him #and all their whining mostly boiled down to him not GMing a horror game like one would DM D&D #it was just a fundamental misunderstanding of how horror stories sort of have to get told #in order to actually scare your players #and give them the core experience of HORROR that they came to the table to feel #I love running horror games #I think Spenser is not only doing great #but he’s got quite a few tricks I want to try out myself #This is not DM vs Player mentality #this is literally just how you play these sorts of games #constantly being close to death or running out of resources

[ladytabletop]

Do you have any suggestions for a two person letter writing games? I've seen a couple on itch but haven't ever tried one. One of my ttrpg friends moved states and we still play online but something physical and asynchronous could be fun

Oh heck yeah do I have recommendations for you.

If you want something setting-agnostic:

Ephemeron by ephemeron

It functions as a collaborative world building exercise between player/s and GM, in which letters and other ephemera are used to create and describe a world and a series of events that might transpire within it.

If you want something with romance (pining involved):

Empanel by Bogus Cheesecake

Empanel is a two-player narrative roleplaying game based around telegrams and queer yearning.

Beyond Reach by Annie Johnston-Glick

Beyond Reach is a two person play by post game about falling in love with someone unattainable to you. One player is a mech, the other their pilot.

If you want sci-fi generation ships:

Signal to Noise by LunarShadowDesigns (this is a personal favorite of mine)

One player takes on the role of the Explorer, one of the lucky few chosen to join the generation ship while the other takes on the role of the Earther, forced to stay behind as their companion departs the solar system.

The Wanderers by Adventure by Mail

YOU AND YOUR FRIEND wait to board two ARK-4 Civilian Class Shuttles charted for new colonies in the hinterlands of space.

If you want observers outside of time:

The Reaper's Almanac by Mitch Schiwal

The players will portray Reapers who write to one another after reaping a human in order to keep them alive in memory.

chronicle by A. Fell

The CHRONICLER documents a world, neither part of it nor detached from it. The WITNESSES find their artifacts some time later, and reflect, and remember.

if you want something specifically designed for messaging instead of mail:

When the Messages Began by Law of Names Media

You live in the dark. Or you did, until the computer came to life.

What's a Vaporwave? by fen slattery

One player is Casey, who kinda knows what vaporwave is. Another is Grandpa, who loves Casey and wants to understand their life. Played via text message.

and finally some miscellany:

A Response to the Esteemed Dr. Crackpot by Emily Jankowski

A game of academic squabbles for two or more players. Fight for your hypothesis in a series of responses published by one of the journals in your field. Defend your academic integrity at all costs. Everyone needs to know your rival is wrong.

Epistolary by En Sattaur

In Epistolary, the player characters work together to solve a mystery and prevent something terrible from happening.

Your Friend in Witchcraft by Kay Marlow Allen

One player will portray the Novice: you are new to witching; there are no other witches in your community who can advise you. The other player will portray the Expert: you're an old hand at witching, and have knowledge to share.

And if you need more to whet your appetite, you can check out the Step Up for the Postal Service game jam!

#the lady answers

[fels-fantasy-hoard]

I’m curious and not able to do proper research rn, how do other combat oriented ttrpgs handle health? Both player and enemy health.

I’m trying to simplify things on the gm’s side for my ttrpg Tales from the Aether and came up with this idea and I wanna know if other ttrpgs have similar ideas or did it better

Players have a health number that is reduced through dice from enemy attacks like normal dnd/pathfinder.

Enemies have a number of hearts. Each heart is worth 10 points of damage. When a player strikes an enemy and deals damage, round to the nearest fifths place (10, 15, 20, etc) and the player deals X amount of hearts. (1, 1 and a half, 2), etc. when the enemy runs out of hearts, it dies. Healing works the same way.

My reasoning is: when I’m a player I love rolling to see how much damage I do so I wanted to keep that part of the game while alleviating the math burden for the gm so the game’s pacing doesn’t drag.

Implementation: my system would come with templates for enemies you can print/fill out online, etc that come with hearts. You fill in the hearts as the creature takes damage and erase hearts that have been healed.

What are ur thoughts? What other ttrpgs handle health like this or similarly or within the same spirit?

#tales from the Aether #ttrpg #indie ttrpg #asking for advice

[aotopmha]

The FF14 community has a sarcastic saying along the lines of "great community btw", which is used in cases whenever someone or some group of awful people pop up doing something shitty and which I find annoying.

I think it is really obnoxious because having a great community does not mean there will never be any awful people in that community.

Especially when you get an award for stuff like having a great community – something that in many spaces is usually based on popularity or earned via nebulous committee vote.

That's just not how people work. And putting that strange standard on every single person in that community is really unrealistic.

In fact, I think it would be creepier if occasional assholes didn't pop up. Actual cult behaviour entails a situation where nobody is frustrated, critical or says anything bad about each other ever.

And this is doubly so for stuff that is popular.

We have 30 million accounts in the game now. Do you honestly expect not one of them to be made by an awful person?

The second frustration I have is tying social media with the community. Yoshi-P and his team, don't, even in fact, straight-up can't really, moderate what happens on social media, on Twitter, Reddit, Discord etc.

And as far as I know their official accounts keep it pretty basic and chill.

So, a lot of the bad stuff is just the nature of social media and the internet.

Now, this actually does not mean the dev team bears no responsibility because what they can do is minimise the poison within the game itself.

FF14 is probably the cleanest multiplayer community I've been apart of ever. The most I've gotten is generic insults in French.

The lack of gamerwords in my 3 months of time surprised me the most, and so did the occasional actual compliments. We just either talk about the game or what issues there are with us doing the mechs or disband when stuff isn't working out and time is getting wasted.

But I also know many haven't been as lucky and some of the security features were dated even by the time the game re-released back in 2013.

The friendlist is a mess because it doesn't block properly, and I know stories of people who had to go to another region to escape their stalker.

The GMs, while preferrable to any automated moderation, still don't catch everything, sometimes for years, especially whistleblowers who signal stuff in specific codewords and technically aren't breaking the rules.

Unjust massreportings can happen.

Reporting can be clunky and from what I've explored is hidden behind some menuing instead of just being an open option like in many other online games.

So they kinda can't control Twitter or Reddit at all and they can't change human nature, but I think they can modernise a bunch of the social tab.

I also haven't experienced the game as a non-sprout/at endgame yet, which I'm told can make a difference. Part of the reason why I find the game so rewarding is because you find so many different experiences and opinions in just Duty Finder and you just sometimes get to talking with them about the game and then various other things.

Recently, many gathered to honor Akira Toriyama in many of the data centers and people were just kind of talking to each other about DB and other series.

And I've never seen anything like this in any other MMO or any multiplayer games. I know it happened for Kentaro Miura, too, when he died.

So clearly, the social element is a huge part of the identity of an MMO, so if they mean they're improving the MMO in the MMO, I hope this also includes the social tab features.

#Final Fantasy XIV #Final Fantasy 14 #FF14 #FFXIV #FF #Final Fantasy

[open-hearth-rpg]

Hearts of Wulin Now at Age of Ravens

Hearts of Wulin, a PbtA game of wuxia romance and melodrama is now at Age of Ravens Games. Written by Joyce Ch*ng and Lowell Francis (me). This game and its expansion, Hearts of Wulin Worlds, offers a range of playstyles by focusing on the powerful heroes trapped by a web of obligations and personal desires. 

It’s pretty awesome IMHO. It draws on the literature of writers like Jin Yong and Gu Long, in particular adaptations of those stories in dozens and dozens of TV series (Laughing in the Wind, The Proud Twins). It also works to include things like more recent web novels and their adaptations, with rules for xianxia and the fantastic. The core book includes ideas for various genres, narrating fight scenes, building entanglements, and handling historical/courtly games. 

Hearts of Wulin: Worlds includes several settings: 

Shadow of Joseon, set during the Korean Joseon Dynasty. (Yeonsoo Julian Kim)

1905: San Francisco, presents a Chinatown just emerging from the shadow of the Chinese Exclusion Act. (Banana Chan)

Cour de l'Eppee transports Hearts of Wulin to swashbuckling France. (Cat Evans)

Academy of the Blade offers a dueling academy inspired by Revolutionary Girl Utena. (Alison Tam)

Fight Me IRL is a unique take on cyberpunk. (James Mendez Hodes) 

Silk & Steam gives you a wondrous silkpunk setting. (Kienna Shaw)

It also includes two major rules add-ons:

The Villain, a new playbook. Not all wulin "Heroes" are heroes with a capital H. Some start in a darker place... 

Numberless Secrets, a new set of rules for telling mystery/investigation stories in Hearts of Wulin. 

These can be found on Drivethrurpg– both are part of the ongoing GMs Day sale happening right now. 

Personally I’m really excited about the future for Hearts of Wulin. Though I never learned the print run, I do know that the last of the physical copies recently sold out at Indie Press Revolution. I have a short list of things I’m hoping to accomplish. 

Get it up on itch.io. I know some folks prefer to get their ttrpg pdfs via that site. 

Figure out how to get Print-on-Demand versions up on Drivethru. I’ve been told this is a challenging process to get right, so I’m hoping to talk to some folks who have done it before. 

Publish the Names & Entanglements deck. This was a self-print add-on for Hearts of Wulin. It's a useful resource for character creation and I’m hoping to have physical copy available for sale. 

I’ve always said folks should feel free to hack and rework Hearts of Wulin as they wish. But I’d like to get a clear Creative Commons license out there for everyone and encourage folks to play around with the system.

Eventually I might do a 1.5 version bringing some of the HoW: Worlds material over into the main book, as well as a couple of rules updates.

I want to publish a collection of Numberless Secrets mysteries along with guidance for running detective wuxia games. I love the series Ancient Detective and this is the best way I get to play out those kinds of stories. 

Get an online keeper which has easy to use set ups for all of the expansion worlds. We have a solid one– newly automated thanks to Agatha– but it doesn’t have all the expansions. 

Some folks have done from amazing things with HoW so far (inspired by media like Scott Pilgrim, Cobra Kai, Star Wars and beyond). It would be great if I could assemble a collection of new hacks and settings, maybe with some additional play options.

Finalize the one translation agreement I’ve been offered. 

I want to thank everyone who has read and/or played Hearts of Wulin. It remains a game I love to run and it would be amazing to have more people try it out.

#ttrpg #rpg #age of ravens #hearts of wulin