Brian Stanfield

. . . and then he gets beheaded for desertion . . .

At this point, I'm hoping that the final episode ends with Bob Newhart waking up and saying, "Wow! I just had the weirdest dream." Experience Points awarded for those of you who get the joke. . . .

There was a point where Cersei actually had her arm entwined through Missandei's arm, which seems like it would have offset any grappling penalty. Perhaps even bonus. All she had to so was clench her arm to her waist and jump. As I said earlier, her last words should have been, "You're coming with me!"

This is good to know. I'm curious how your house-ruled END, if you could tell me more. Or at least lead me to the right forum where you do discuss it.

I suspect this is what Ron Edwards is working on with Champions Now. I may not use his rule set, but I will read his book cover to cover. I like what I’ve read so far, and love his ideas. Because of him I will run all my campaigns, supers and heroes alike, at 5 Active Points = 1 Endurance. It requires the players to deal with the game mechanics narratively as they get too tired to continue fighting. Just this idea alone changed the way I look at the way the mechanics can interact and inspire role playing.

Maybe if they had more Starbucks on the set they wouldn’t be so complacent. Oh, wait . . .

I summarized my exasperation to my friend thusly: “It took them two years to write this crap?!” He agreed that the problems showed up when they overtook the books. And why the hell aren’t the books done yet?! Unfortunately, it’s already in the can and there’s no way to pressure them into better writing. There is no “next season,” and the writers have extended themselves way beyond their abilities.

I didn’t mean to come across as dismissive. I used “handwaving” based on someone else’s post, but may mean something different by it. I agree with you that the best parts of the game are when the players interact and spontaneously build the game, and I consider the rules to be guidelines to help resolve and balance that creativity. I don’t consider that to be an afterthought to the mechanics; I actually see it more as the opposite. How ‘bout I replace “handwave a bunch of stuff” with “make judgments on many important elements that are not rules related”? I always read the 6e rules, despite many complaints to the contrary, as guidelines for play since they are constantly reminding the reader that it is only a game, and the rules are there to facilitate play, not constrain it. Hence the provisos about common sense and game balance, etc. I think Aaron Allston understood this in the early ‘80s when the rules were still pretty much wide open. All his “old school” advice pretty much still holds up. The players and play are more important than the rules.

I need to rig up a mug-apult, or a very large barista, er, I mean ballista to test it out.

I tried to sign up, but I was too late. The Revelations session is at a bad time for me because the guy I’ll be with has to be up early for meetings. So I couldn’t sign up for that one. I’m totally shut out of the HERO sessions this year! I really wanted to do the Ninja Hero session.

This reminds me of when I tried to figure out, according to the rules, if it was possible to throw a coffee mug with enough momentum to both disintegrate but also blow a hole through a wall. I quickly got lost in the rules, and gave up. I really hope one of my players doesn’t throw a coffee cup at a wall.

I always figured that this sort of situation is why the 6e mantra exists in the rules: “consider common sense, game balance, special effects, etc. etc.” Those provisos are an acknowledgement that the GM still has to handwave a bunch of stuff, despite the particular rules.

I once witnessed a high speed front-on collision while waiting at the T intersection where two cars collided. I ran to the closest car, and as I was trying to get a door open to check on the woman, a huge pool of red fluid started flowing out from under the passenger compartment. I was horrified, and afraid of what I might find inside the car. It turns out it was only the transmission fluid “bleeding” onto the highway. So yes, bleeding rules do apply to cars.

Odd. Does this mean Greyworm isn’t a significant character of color? I’d say they may have forgotten he’s still alive, except that he was right outside the wall watching the whole thing.

I almost killed everyone’s good time when I was yelling at the tv during last week’s episode, for this very reason. What the hell?! I kinda thought everyone would be a lot happier for having beaten the white walkers and ending the long night. I understand the somber mood, but I would have expected a more celebratory heroes’ good bye. I really started to wonder about the quality of writing at this point. Seriously, the Lord of the Rings moment two weeks ago with the singing and montage drove me nuts. I nearly lost my mind at this scene. Two harpoons killed one dragon, and then Dani actually did dive-bomb the shi-s, only to turn away when all she had to do was strafe her way through them and then turn around and clean up the rest of the fleet. I was yelling at the tv again. And then they suddenly had a hail of harpoons to shoot the ships. Why did t they use that tactic against the two dragons and both would-be successors to the throne?! And by the way, why didn’t they notice an entire fleet while they were flying around in the sky? This is nearly unforgivable writing. Aaaaannnnd this scene pretty much killed the whole thing for me. So any plot holes! Why not harpoon the dragon while he’s just lazily sitting there? They already demonstrated their superior range. Why is Danni so determined to arch south on King’s Landing with, what, twenty soldiers rather than wait for the others to rest and get ready? I mean, this was truly embarrassing for her. No need to negotiate now. And why not just end everything and kill them all? Cersei isn’t that honorable. I’m still not sure why she didn’t kill them all when they first met at King’s Landing. And Sheesh! Cersei actually had her arm locked around hers, telling her she’s going to die. Shouldn’t her last words be, “You’re coming with me,” and then dragging her over the edge of the wall with her? Im all for dramatic confrontations, and the personal conflicts, but this is turning into soap-opera-grade writing. *Rant over* Maybe. . .

I lost 20 pounds from the cancer this year, so I’d imagine that I’ll sink to the bottom even faster now, like a lawn dart.

I can vouch for the “too dense to swim” angle, as I have very dense bones and can virtually walk across the bottom of a pool with lots breath of air in my lungs. I can swim if I want, because I learned how as a child, but I’m horribly inefficient at it and would sell back some swimming on my character sheet.

I figured that was what your post was about, and I was going to send him a message to clarify the problem, but I figured you had it in hand. Dan Simon answered my question in the Hero Designer, saying Reduced END did not factor into the prorated cost, and it matches what I was seeing in my example knife, so I think he’s on the same page with RAW as far as I can tell, although he didn’t give a list of the Advantages that are excluded. I think as an easy solution to the HD problem (if there is one) is to add custom Limitations to offset the Advantages, or just a Negative Custom Adder at the end to offset the real cost. This isn’t a perfect solution, but I think it works well enough.

Steve may come up with an official ruling, but Dan Simon has already made an official ruling on how Hero Designer shall interpret this, and you’ll not see him budge . . .

I love the animal handling and insight stuff on page two! Not a dog romp, indeed.

I’m more inclined, after thinking on this a while, to agree with Archer and just accept that all Power Advantages actually affect damage in one way or another, and so should be included in the calculation of extra Damage Classes.

One of the GM screens you can download has a chart for body based on mass. As mass increases, so does body. I don’t know the original source for it, and there’s no way I’d normally remember something like this, but I happened to be looking at GM screens yesterday for my Pulp Hero game this afternoon, and noticed this particular chart.

This reminds me of that fight scene in the bathroom in the movie Jack Reacher.

Bag of dice. (I know I'm in good company when I say, seriously, you should see my bag of dice)

I settled on just generating a list of contacts, and then adding custom adders to reduce their cost to zero. Good enough for me!