GMJoe

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Formerly known as 'user867.'

	2,705 reputation	bio	website		visits	member for	1 year, 5 months
523 badges		location	Melbourne, Australia		seen	1 hour ago

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Apr 19	comment	Are my vassals ripping me off? @BraddSzonye Yes - I should probably have specified in the above that that '10,000 gp' is net profit before taxes. I'll edit the question.
Apr 18	awarded	Nice Question
Apr 18	awarded	Promoter
Apr 18	revised	Are my vassals ripping me off? Improved layout and wording to make the question clearer.
Apr 17	reviewed	Reviewed Should long Aspects be split?
Apr 17	comment	How does a DM correct the balance after accidentally giving the players too much gold? In some games, wealth does not significantly affect game balance. Even in those games, however, gameplay can suffer from too much money being given out to players too quickly, so this question is still useful for those.
Apr 16	comment	Can a sleeping character Hide? @KRyan I was responding to your "I do not see any indication that there is ever such a thing as a 'pre-rolled opposed check' like you describe" comment. As you can see, there is such a thing, if only in exceptional circumstances. Now, we need to determine why those circumstances qualify as exceptional and see if hiding before sleeping meets those same requirements.
Apr 16	comment	Would there be an appropriate punishment for failing to protect a host from another clan? It's not just "Is a guest responsible for the safety of their host under the code of Bushido," but "how far does that responsibility extend" and "under what conditions is it honourable to fail?" Plus there's the other side of the question, "to what extent is a host entitled to impose their own concerns upon guests?" This is an interesting question, indeed.
Apr 16	comment	How is character development realised in Mongoose Traveller? Argh, is this argument really worth having? Yes, the game has rules for permanent character advancement, and yes, there's a lot of opportunity for character development that doesn't involve pure numerical improvement. Can't these two truths co-exist? And can't the off-topic discussion about whether Traveller is gamist or simulationist take place in chat?
Apr 15	comment	Can a sleeping character Hide? -1 because the rules for spot checks don't work that way.
Apr 15	comment	Can a sleeping character Hide? @KRyan Doesn't the forgery skill explicitly require the check to be made secretly by the GM before the document gets inspected? And a disguise skill roll is made once, and the same result is used every time someone inspects the disguised character... Or am I misremembering?
Apr 15	comment	How is character development realised in Mongoose Traveller? Incidentally, there is a brief note on how skills can be improved in Mongoose Traveller - at the end of the skills chapter, I believe. Skills are increased by spending weeks devoted to training, rather than as a reward for achieving goals (as in many other games), with the number of weeks required to increase a skill being increased based on how skilled the character is already. The rate of improvement is quite slow in typical play, however, and so SevenSidedDie's answer (below) is still quite valid.
Apr 15	comment	Resources for Complex Puzzle-Traps This isn't worthy of being a full answer, but when I want to test the ingenuity and creativity of players, I present them with a situation that doesn't make sense on first analysis. Generally, they'll come up with all sorts of experiments to work out what they're missing - and when they work it out, they'll try and look for a meaning behind it or a use they can put it to.
Apr 15	comment	Resources for Complex Puzzle-Traps @thatgirldm For my own purposes, I spent some time considering this, and I've come to the conclusion that it's not as hard as it seems. Myst puzzles are generally a combination of these three basic types: 1) puzzles that require players to recognise links between clues presented out of context in different locations, 2) complex systems governed by logical rules that can be discovered through trial and error, and 3) hidden object puzzles. The third type arguably represents some of the weakest puzzles in the series; One can design puzzles of the other two types that work in a verbal medium.
Apr 12	comment	How is a play-by-email game actually played? @SevenSidedDie It's not a real problem that I face, though, since I've got no plans to join or run such a game. I'm hoping my comment will inspire someone who does need to know to ask.
Apr 11	comment	Where did the Chromatic/Metallic Dragons come from? That is what the words mean, but the OP wants to know if the various kinds of dragon that appear in D&D are based on or inspired by some other work - Like, were the different colours of evil dragon based on a particular author's ideas?
Apr 11	comment	Why do D&D Paladins Have to Be Lawful Good? @Dakeyras Hmm, I must be misremembering, then.
Apr 11	comment	How is a play-by-email game actually played? The big question I'd like to add to this is "How do you compensate for the large wait times between turns?" I can't imagine maintaining narrative tension over the months it would take to resolve a multiple-turn combat...
Apr 11	comment	Creating NPCs from Real-Life People +1 for the second half of the last sentence. Insulting your friends is potentially bad for obvious reasons.
Apr 11	comment	Why do D&D Paladins Have to Be Lawful Good? I'm guessing it was because character classes were originally designed to represent archetypes from fantasy fiction, rather than sets of abilities. Another example is the cleric class, which was explicitly a servant of good gods prior to third edition. (That said, some editions included notes on how to modify the class to serve evil gods.)