Nobleshield

@Nerdcognito @Lordmatteus2312 @glewis2317

I'd like to be the first one to welcome @Lordmatteus2312 and @glewis2317 to the VultureDM club. Don't worry about dues, vulture pays them for you! First round is on me, boys!

@headlocks000 @PlatinumWoW654 Actually yes. Data mining is cancer

@PlatinumWoW654 Would you rather them not test content? Rare bad take from you here.

WoW's storytelling will suffer as long as Blizzard keeps putting entire campaign storylines on the PTR months in advance and fail to encrypt cinematics Imagine going to see a movie and being shown a synopsis of every major plot point before the film even starts. What a joke.

@dosegenderos @DoinksTheFrog Silence is golden but duct tape is silver 😬

@DoinksTheFrog Real women want to be gagged to stifle this instinct.

Women love to talk

@DanielDnDYT My point is their opinions are worthless

And? Some people say thing isn't a defense. Technically AD&D, 2e, basic, none of it is OSR. OSR is a design philosophy based on bringing old school style systems back. AD&D is just IS, old school, not OSR. That aside, if a player draws the line of "old school" as "under the control of the original designer" in what way does that invalidate anything they have to say? They are expressing an opinion of what the criteria for Old School should be

This sort of just reinforces for me that most of the "discussion" online about how "bad" 5e is comes from people whose only experience with it is watching performative stuff like Critical Role, rather than actually having played it at all.

@dosegenderos Soon you'll be wearing UGGs and craving PSLs

This song is fucking incredible, shut up. youtu.be/5a-tg5WVbeE?is…

@SanguineRuby I'll save my money hiring a crappy artist and use AI instead

Hey guys, I’m poor. Art is NOT unobtainable. It is not too expensive, and it is not always even generally expensive. “I can’t afford a $200 art piece” Ok get a $25 one “I don’t like the quality” That sucks There are GREAT artists at that price point. Don’t discount them

@DanielDnDYT I mean I've been told by a lot of people that 2nd edition doesn't count as "OSR" because it's after Gary left so... 🤷🏻‍♂️

That depends on definitions and it's a foolish rubric to measure by. Take Max Liao, he says D&D ended at 2e and what we call 3e was WOTC D20 Fantasy 1e because it is a fundamentally different game. That's a very fair position to take. Now if the ONLY reason you rail against it is because it is not the D&D you like, that's another story, but you are using too broad a brush

@RamerPaul64 I'm really talking about creativity in RPGs here, not anything else, but sometimes I feel like I don't know. It's hard to explain.

@RamerPaul64 I don't know if I even could go offline. The sad part is I don't even know if it's really a problem. Like everyone will tell me it is but it doesn't feel like one at all.

I've been noticing more and more that my creativity, if I had any at all (I can't remember; I am 100% serious), has diminished to where thinking outside the box literally makes no sense to me. I see (or hear) words, and they are coherent words, but they have no meaning to me.

@DanielDnDYT Yeah but a lot of those people also think D&D after 1985 isn't D&D because that's around when Gary was removed. So I really don't consider anything they say in the first place because they're so far removed from reality.

It really isn't. 5evis a serviceable game, but it is built to cater to a radically different playstyle than older editions. Even before CR and D&D getting co-opted by a radical social leftist activist base, it was already rejected by most 3.5e and nearly all TSR edition players. It's good for what it is, but those groups tend to feel what it is, is inferior

This looks amazing! Thanks Yggr I love it

@Nobleshield Critical Role Deragement Syndrome. Both sides suffer from it. Sparkle Trolls and Shit Goblins alike.

@WizardGoesBoom Oooh exciting

Already started coding the GM Chatbot in Python. Making good progress

@GaryD20Games @dholt31 The mob is usually more trustworthy

@dholt31 Comparing cops to mob criminals is an appropriate comparison.

I have an important Public Service Announcement to pass along. When a cop puts gloves on, it's not because his fingers are chilly. It's because he expects that you are about to leak bodily fluids and he doesn't want to get those fluids on his hands. When you see the gloves come on, you have zero seconds to reverse course on whatever you were doing. The probability of you leaking bodily fluids is now almost 100%. Imagine getting called to meet with the mobsters you owe money to, and you're late paying. If you get there and they're spreading plastic sheets on the floor, you have zero seconds to hand them a stack of bills. The cop and the mobsters are way ahead of you and you really need to catch up.

@NewYorker Her translation is complete dogshit.

Emily Wilson, whose 2017 translation of the Odyssey Christopher Nolan drew on for his new film, has brought Homer back from antiquity. One of the most celebrated translators in the world, she is reviving a fading academic discipline and shining with a harsh and brilliant light in the humanities’ gathering gloom. “The ancient Greeks teach one to be modern,” the poet and classicist A. E. Stallings observed. “They taught that to me and to Emily. It was time to strip away all the mannered layers—the tarnish of centuries—and she does that. Her translations have the freshness of the sky after a storm. Read Judith Thurman’s 2023 profile of the translator: newyorkermag.visitlink.me/KHq2J7

My issues with 5e are solely within the characters. What is available, what they can do and how they do it. So, character creation + some game mechanics. I find it insincere to have bitched about rules lawyers for decades just to now slam drama kids when our tables finally get some role-play. Also interesting that everyone claims to support “play how you want” but then when Critical Role gets mentioned, they have opinions on the right and wrong way to play. I can’t stand CR, but I don’t think I’m supposed to. I’m not in their target demographic.

@Stewby_Stew It really just solidifies to me that most of the people complaining about 5e have never actually played it and are basing their knowledge on junk like critical role.

@Nobleshield I cut and paste every time I see such nonsense. We all loved at least one predetermined/scripted adventure…

You know, for all the online BS about 5.5e having "predetermined" storylines and scripting like Critical Role, this is what the 5.5 Dungeon Master's Guide ACTUALLY says about it: (Chapter 4 - Creating Adventures) "You might find it helpful to think about an adventure not as a narrative that arcs from beginning to end with little chance for deviation, but more in terms of situations that you are presenting to the characters. The adventure unfolds organically from the players' responses to the situations you present." (Chapter 5 - Creating Campaigns) "A campaign is like a series of comics or TV shows, where each adventure (like an issue of a comic or a TV episode) tells a self-contained story that contributes to the larger story. Just like with an adventure, a campaign's story isn't predetermined, because the actions of the players' characters will influence how the story plays out." This is the same advice that's been given to DMs for 40-odd years now.

Need a book reviewer? You can find me on Reedsy Discovery and Book Sirens! booksirens.com/reviewer/N8XPG… reedsy.com/discovery/user…

Been seeing a lot of AI reference complaints lately, and I have an opinion on it—following logic. Testing that logic now against you guys, with two points on the graph: Person A uses a curated prompt for AI to generate a bespoke reference image that immutably presents their ideas visually to the liking of the person. The AI itself trained on endless artists for reference and produced the image emulating their skillsets. Person A presents this reference to artists, and the response is rejection. "AI is theft! You stole from artists like me! You should have had a real artist make a proper reference!" Person B uses endless art from the Internet to make a collaged moodboard. Person B curates a verbal description to explain the concepts. The combined reference is mutable and not entirely visual, meaning artists will misinterpret more concepts. Person B presents this reference packet to artists. No complaints or rejection. For these two scenarios to balance against the underlying logic of art theft, Person B should receive a rejection as well. "You stole all those works from real artists like me! You should have had a real artist make a proper reference!" With AI references, which are temporary and not intended to enter the commercial space that affects artists anyway, we get a canned and generic response that accomplishes nothing and proposes something impractical. With moodboards, which similarly use potentially commercial works in a non-commercial manner that doesn't affect artists, we should expect a similar level of hatred and response. Instead we get acceptance, and even preference for this method. The only factors differing in these processes, and thus the only logical reason for the different responses: 1. The references were made by AI. 2. Person A created preferable immutable references rather than Person B's mutable concepts. Point 1 is entirely mechanical, and as technology progresses we should expect new mechanisms. This is rejection of progress in a field. If Point 1 drives your rejection, you may be illogically, emotionally defending stagnation. Point 2 is not a proper point of contention. As an artist, you should WANT immutable references where possible. If Point 2 drives your rejection, you are objectively an unprofessional artist. Neither of these differing points justifies the change in outcomes. For this reasoning, I can declare that rejecting AI references as an artist is, at very least, an illogical or unprofessional choice.