D&D Meta Thread

[Alice]

I came up with a viable approach to rescue a person from a dangerous source of electricity. Take it or leave it.

Uh oh, Alice is making up scenarios again. The throne is only big enough for the gem.
Let's roll:
First, how good or bad the consequences are for Alice making up scripted scenarios while not being DM: [1d20=1] okay that's very very bad. Now we will roll the magatude of the issue Alice has added to this scenario [1d20=17] pretty devastating

>magatude

You can thank Alice for her contribution to your fate. Anything Alice plans will go the opposite way and have horrendous consequences.

Yes, yes it was like this from the beginning. Think of something new!

[Ashley] thanks Alice, also, why would I electrocute myself?  That's not what heroes do.

Yes that's exactly what heroes do! Electrocute themselves.
We have no chance against that real drow ear haver who's likely more powerful than Mormesk and the green eyeball thing together. Only the Mecha Goddess can beat him. And she only takes over when you're dead. So you have to die. Don't blame me, I didn't make those rules. And I ain't no hero either. That's a hero's job. But I can tie you a noose of you prefer a more traditional approach.

[Joy]

[Kashtan]

ok to be fair the whole discussion was moot as Yulya said from the start she will investigate and search the area for traps before anyone does anything stupid

[Τamamo]

Are Bless and Emboldening Bond still in effect? I read nothing they expired.
I guess those guys can use magic so we gotta restrain them. Should Cat and Alice attempt to grapple one each? Or should we focus everything on the right one to take him down?

[Joy]

Embolding bond is still in effect

[Kashtan]

Yulya had a clever idea.
everyone attack the ghoul on the right. then Yulya will move 5ft w and use Channel Divinity - Turn Undead. all 3 will be in range. if the attacked ghoul survives it will try to get out of combat and trigger reaction attacks and Cats sentinel. this will also keep them from doing any nonsense with magic. unless they make their saves. but it should significantly reduce the number of enemies.

[Joy]

[Ashley] don't forget bless

[Alice]

Has the ring regenerated yet? I looked up Turn Undead and that's pretty neat! I'd give it priority over Bless. The turned zombies will stop being a danger and this will buy us time

[Joy]

She has one more charge according to my records as well as one Sorceress Point. She has 1MP, 1 focus with 6MP and one with 1MP that Ashley gave her. I believe she cast bless, then charged the focus for 6 and also used the focus once for 2MP on top of the focus.

These ghouls are technically alive and therefore immune to turn undead. When they become zombie ghouls then it would work.

[Kashtan]

>technically alive
wtf ghouls are textbook undead creatures



i mean youre the dm but declaring them non-undead after Yulya comes up with turning them is a bit eh...

[Joy]

Oh, so now you want to do your own research. These are all custom monsters as we've already discussed.

It was proposed that they could be turned, my answer to that is no because they're technically alive. As has been stated before unless otherwise specified, any name may or may not coincide with standard creatures. Alice agreed this was best previously but I didn't not require her agreement. Even the very first creature you fought was a custom rothe.

[Alice]

I agree I like it better that way because it makes things much more unpredictable and thus interesting. We have no monster expert, at best Cat has some experience with a few. We shouldn't know the monsters stats, strengths and weaknesses. And neither should they all be clones. But this does create some serious gameplay problems. We don't look up monsters we don't know anything about. But if we already encountered them and think we know them (or because it's common sense that a ghoul is undead) but they're special snowflakes who are just different - that's fun but it either leads to catastrophic events like Yulya wasting a Turn Undead on an obvious undead who's surprisingly not undead at all, and everyone getting killed - or endless discussions like we have now.

So what to do about this? Realistically, it should happen frequently that we use ineffective attacks against monsters we misjudge. But realistically, adventurers would perish after a few encounters, and never live long enough to level up or become heroes. I'm not sure how to resolve this. One method I proposed is to plot us against more low-level but cunning enemies who can be adjusted to permit serious mistakes without immediate TPK. But this would drag out the game for years due to XP starving.

On the other hand, right now we are up against such high level foes that we basically have to execute every attack perfectly in order to have some chance. And telling us beforehand what doesn't work isn't really fun either and - as I frequently criticize - leads to a scripted story that leaves us no options, and no means to make mistakes. But I understand mistakes mess up the game and create even more work for Joy. I still think we should be permitted to make serious and epic fails.

So my suggestion - if an enemy deviates significantly from what is commonly expected, give us a hint by describing it. We will accept any monster stat you design, from living skeletons to corporeal ghosts, but there should be at least some clue. In exchange - no more telling us beforehand what doesn't work. Only by observation or divine intervention should we learn something like that.

Does that sound good?

[Joy]

>So what to do about this?

This is one of the best benefits of being DM. We don't do anything about this, I decide.

>give us a hint

Certainly! So far you have experienced this enemy type before, and so you have learned things, like you know they're not undead because they had a zombie form and that form cannot exist after dying as undead. You can only live once and you can only undead once, so if you die as undead, you stay dead dead. You also know they're tougher than the classic ghoul, but their zombie form was closer to the classic definition. If you like, call these elite commander pre-undead ghouls.

>low level cunning enemies

That's a great idea! When you're DM, I think you should do that.

>execute every attack perfectly

That's the one, good luck! Frankly the dice have been super nice to you so often I wonder if SheShe is actually interfering subconsciously in some way, like a DID way which is rather frightening.

>isn't really fun.

So sorry you're not having fun, my main objective is to make it as fun as possible but I am regrettably forced to have a Bear brain with inherent limitations.

>scripted story

Do we need more operant conditioning? I think this is a projection of an Alice problem of perception. It's serious, but I do believe it has improved.

>Does that sound good?

It sounds great! Good job in resolving this issue. As the supreme world leader says, thank you for your attention to this matter.

[Ashley] And God bless America! He should totally add that.