Musing: My Dream and Development Skills

 How to Start?

    I'm struggling to think of a satisfying way to begin this post. This will be largely me rambling, but it's also about how I process game and idea development.

    Ever since my introduction to D&D 3.5 I've always  wanted to create my very own game system. I've been big on game development for literally my whole life, but I struggled to really think of a good way to tackle it until recently. Countless times in the past have I started and immediately stopped trying to develop my game creation skills. It wasn't until I discovered homebrewing for D&D 5e that I finally found my method of game development that's still going on about 5-6 years later. And now I want to achieve that goal, to create something people love to play.

What do I want to achieve?

    This is a question I've been slowly answering over the past few months. As a gamer you know what you enjoy, but when placed in the position to create it you have literally no idea where to begin. This has spiraled into the search for what I want from a game and how to achieve it. I've been doing 200 word games to help hash out smaller ideas, rather than aiming to make an actual game. It forces you to think of the raw essence of your goal and distill it into the purest form. It's my philosophy that if you can make a fun game in 200 words or less, then it's better than a large game with no flavor.

    This is going to be a really long journey. It took me 4 years of homebrewing for D&D until I was finally getting a grasp on development, balance, and flavor. Developing my own system is going to take just as long. Probably longer. But honestly that idea doesn't scare me. In fact I'm excited just typing this. Though this excitement wanes and waxes as it pleases. I'm not always 100%, and you won't either!

Learning to Love Challenge, and other skills

    This is what I consider a very important aspect if you want to seriously game develop. Learning to love a challenge will drive you harder than forcing yourself to develop something to meet a quota. It also allows you to gain motivation through more work. Being excited for the unknown is an extremely powerful tool that keeps you interested. Honestly I didn't have this at first - I had literally over 16 years of ideas trapped in my head, which allowed me to create an absolutely inhuman amount of content when I first started development (As stated within my first blog). 

    But once you hit a wall where you need to develop new skills is the right time to learn to love the challenge. Get excited for not knowing how to tackle an idea, because you don't know how awesome the end results will be. That's what truly drives me. Unfortunately not all ideas are winners, and it's best to accept they're okay, or bad, then move onto a new project. The idea is to keep the ball rolling, then tackle a bad idea again later. Be sure you save all your work, you'll need it later down the line, even if it's a really bad idea. It's my personal philosophy that no idea is inherently bad; it's the execution. Take the Diablo franchise as an example. Imagine if all it had was fighting monsters in a new environment every few hours. Not interesting or fun. But when you add skills, random potential, powerful and interesting loot, and a plot line, the idea becomes more grand. By exploring separate ideas, they can become a conglomerate and create a greater whole.

Collateral Inspiration

     Another skill to learn is to work on ideas adjacent to the first one when you're stuck and you will often solve two problems at once. I call this collateral inspiration. This is such a powerful tool and I didn't realize I had it until later. Once I realized its existence, I put it to practical use and suddenly jumped forward in progress. Sometimes you can create exploding collateral inspiration, where solving two problems you were stuck on creates new ideas.

    An example of collateral inspiration is you want to work on an ice themed warrior. You might be stuck with some mechanics or imagery behind it. Then work on something else ice themed, perhaps a monster, or create an ice priest. Another amazing idea is to invent a new character within a world you're familiar with and imagine how they interact with it. Creating a character more often than not creates explosive collateral inspiration.

Make something that excites you

     I can't emphasize this enough. If you aren't excited by what you're looking at then you should work on the idea more. An interesting idea doesn't mean it's fun, either. There's plenty of paved paths that are really fun despite never deviating from the normal, as in they're fun not just because it's interesting, but because it's fun and interesting. This is by far the hardest challenge you'll face. It's one I'm dealing with now. How do you create a meaningful mechanic fun and flavorful without making it too obtuse or have it weighed down by its own idea? The idea of a blood mage is really fun, but the issue is the mechanics are weighing itself down; it's defeating itself before it can even get out of the gate. Many blood mages I see are too complicated for their own good.

Make something for you, not them

    Don't make a game that'll interest hardcore players. Don't make something around a theme just because it sounds interesting. Make it for you, and if you find it fun and exciting, then other people will follow. You can't make something that pleases everyone. You are the first person that you should please. When looking for feedback, ask it only from people you trust and love. People are cruel and uncaring about how or why you arrived at a conclusion; if you start revolving your game around that, you are no longer creating something for yourself, you are making it for them.

    Once you have created something you love, and you have tested this idea to be as balanced as it can be, then you release it into the wild. The wild is full of animals that will rip and shred your material, but it's also full of civilized people. When reading criticism from an animal, treat it like a dog who has torn up its new toy immediately. Disconnect yourself from your work when looking at these comments, or ignore them entirely. Look for people who are interested in aiding you. Look for people who give you a how and why ideas work and don't work. You can usually tell when their words come from a place of love and or respect.

There are innumerous people that disrespect D&D 5e, but there are still thousands of players that love it.

Follow the Fun

    The last musing I'll post. Follow the fun. You find something that isn't a core part of your project, but find it very fun. Incorporate it, or rework your system around the idea and you'll arrive at a better place. There are countless ideas that changed drastically from the original idea because they found a fun idea that worked better than the one they were working on. I've done this several times for my game project despite having a dire attachment to my old ideas that no longer fit the project. You'll hate it at first, then you'll love it later.

Worldbuilding: Astroverse (The Physical Universe)

 Astroverse

     Welcome to my first world building post! I didn't quite consider using my blogs to spout fun ideas for worlds until a friend of mine did so. So strap in! This is a long one.

 
 Admittedly, this is a remake of an older universe that begun with the idea of astrology as its center piece, but then became it's own thing entirely.

 

The Start

 For my first step, I base a world on an interesting idea or theme. In this case, I'm choosing astrology! I love the idea behind it; the stars and planets influencing life on earth, influencing fate itself.

 Next, let's take a look at things I'm going to include or exclude. I'm going to explicitly avoid any gods, demons, and angels this time around. It's tiring hearing the same stories with them involved, even if they don't directly intervene. I will have magic this time, though I'm not sure at what level it is at, but I do know it's tied to the stars.

Planets and Realms 

Tl;dr: Realms exist within a physical location represented as a planet. A realm isn't limited by space like a planet is. Realms have some level of sentience, which creates local laws of physics / magic.

    Rather than a planet just being a physical thing, it'll be a realm in itself, while the realm's physical location is where the planet is located. But in terms of travel, things can get weird, which I'll explain in what a Convergence is. Realms are semi-sentient, like a force with a will, but most (save one) has no explicit personality or goal. Thus, all celestial forces within this universe are entirely neutral; the nature of its people are tied completely to the people itself and nothing else.

    Planets will orbit the Prime realm, which sits at the center of it all. Each plant has a waning and waxing phase where it influences Prime, and much like our real life planet counterparts they have different orbit times and distances. Both the sun (Sol) and moon (Luna) orbit Prime as well.

 

 

The Zodiac, and Oblivion

Tl;dr: Stars create groups called constellations, which make up the schools of magic, which is split evenly into lunar magic and solar branches of magic. Everything outside the sphere of stars is nothingness - no weird creatures, no consuming darkness. Truly nothing.

    Much like planets, stars also have a will, and exert an influence on everything they surround. Unlike our real life counterparts, stars are simply small bodies of light that exist to keep Oblivion at bay.

Stars, the Zodiac

    Stars are scattered throughout the celestial sphere, which marks the end of the solar system.
However those concentrated at the belt horizontal to Prime form the constellations called the Zodiac signs. This is where magic is drawn from, each zodiac representing a school or nature of magic. There are 12 signs, 10 of them are each divided into a court between Sol and Luna, while two of them are transient, belonging to both. The zodiac is tied to the celestial year, and not the year based on your realm (as in, it isn't tied to a month like ours is). There are minor zodiacs that exist just outside of the belt; they hold lesser power and aren't tied to magic.

Oblivion

    Beyond the stars lies oblivion. A place of true nothingness. There is no eldritch force trying to consume the light, there are no dark gods. It is simply a force of nature that lacks material. The celestial sphere "prevents" it from entering the solar system. That is to say it staves off non-existence in a metaphorical manner. Despite its seeming nature, oblivion is also a neutral force.
    Despite its lack of matter, a type of power can be drawn from it, but it is not considered magic. The power drawn from here begets a force of erasure and nullification. Those who have a hatred for magic almost always draw from this force.

Celestial Influence 

Tl;dr: Constellations are called the zodiac, which influences people's behavior and their fate. 

    Ready for your horoscope? The zodiac has a true influence on the lives of people who live within the solar system. Horoscopes fall under Divination magic, by the way. This is a very real thing, but unlike most magic it isn't a science. Being born under a sign gives you a whisper of its magic. That is to say, being born under a sign of Divination magic doesn't mean you'll predict the future, but you'll often find small things edging you towards your goal. An example of this is finding a few extra dollars here and there to buy a new gaming console.

Convergence

Tl;dr: Convergence between realms allows people to simply walk to the other realm. Convergence places can be predicted via math.

    Perhaps one of the most important aspects of this universe is convergence. When this happens, two realms become connected directly via a magical "bridge", so to speak. It isn't total; only a few places will have a direct connection, which changes over time as the planet travels. You may find wild growth suddenly outright replacing that office building that used to sit there. Anything moving into this area immediately transports you onto the planet converging, where you'll find the missing office. Funnily enough, this disconnect doesn't disturb the order of things - internet and electricity still works in the office building stuck on another planet (temporarily), and a tree caught between two worlds still lives normally. Here's what it would look like.

    When you walk onto another plane, you don't collide with whatever is in the center when you leave.

    When magic is low(er), you will only see a ghost of an image from what a convergence would have been. You can still cross, but it's more challenging.

    If you're a really good astrologist, you can predict exactly where these spots will arise (and used to arise) using math. It's an actual science and can save you and your civilization a collective headache.

Realm Influence

 Tl;dr: Realms magically transmute people and things to become more like the realm itself. A realm of fairies influencing the world would cause existing creatures and those who are born during the influence to have those attributes.

    When the Prime is influenced by magic, planets directly interfere with Prime by exerting their will. For example, a planet of faeries would cause more of that type of creature to be born on Prime. Planets will also alter what already exists, so people, plants, and animals may spontaneously gain fairy powers and attributes, for example. During a convergence, such creatures can cross the proverbial road onto the Prime as well. This can cause problems, due to a sudden influx of feral creatures (such as beasts) trying to take over the unfamiliar territory, or cause havoc due to confusion.

Planets

I'm not sure how many planets I'll be including, but let's define just 3 to keep things quick.

Prime

Tl;dr: Prime sits in the center. Zodiac magic and technology works via this realm's sentience. Technology and magic become stronger and weaker with 20-30 thousand year cycles. The cycle doesn't effect creatures created by realm influence or their abilities.

    Despite the celestial name Prime (like Sol, or Luna), the inhabitants all call it something else depending on the culture (which is true for other celestial bodies). Prime is influenced by its neighbors through celestial cycles more than other planets influencing other planets. Magic wanes and waxes over periods of say... 20-30 thousand years, where other realms have magic always on or off. When magic is waning, convergence occurs less often, and not at all during nadir. To keep things familiar, Prime looks and feels much like Earth - the difference comes in when convergence shakes things up.

    The planet has ages, which is divided by waning and waxing magical influence. Each new age builds upon the corpse of the last, which acts as a "fertilizer" for the next, for lack of a better term. There has been more than one modern era, but technology and magic has a strict limit within this universe, preventing one from besting the other. A good example of this is technology becoming inoperable during the apex time of magic, and vice versa. This is the sentience of Prime at work, rather than a mundane or magic universal law.

    The ages do not effect creatures born or influenced by realms. Only magic drawn from the zodiac is effected.

The Wilds

Tl;dr: Wilds are untamed. Because of its sentience, it can't be tamed and will fight back against it. Filled with animals and plants that can grow to epic sizes.

    The closest planet to Prime, the Wilds consists primarily of primeval land. Untamed, untouchable. Here is where nature is strongest; there is always a bigger fish. It's a struggle to survive here, but those that do are exceptionally strong in a physical, mental, or magic manner. The Wilds doesn't consist of just jungle and plant life, there are oceans and deserts much like Earth. The driving difference is you can't claim land, its sentience drives itself to take back any land, sea, or sky that someone is attempting to make a civilized foothold. To live here, you must either be nomadic, or understand how to live with nature by constructing smaller cities of natural material that coexists with the land without taking anything away from it. Fauna and flora can grow to epic and gargantuan portions, such as the Giant's Forest, where trees extend literally into the clouds and its trunk gargantuan.
    The Wilds consist of so much untouched beauty. Its inhabitants are primarily animal in nature - either humanoid or feral beasts. Plant life also takes form as their own type of humanoid and feral beast as well.

Nightmare

 Tl;dr: Nightmare has more sentience than other realms. It sits a little inside Oblivion, which causes its nature. Creatures of nightmare feed on negative emotion, which reduces the amount of it in the realm it influences, but if food is scarce it creates more negative emotion instead. Those born of nightmare are extremely powerful outside of light.

    The last plant we'll touch on. Nightmare sits at the literal edge of Oblivion, existing half in the solar system, half in Oblivion. It has by far the longest celestial year of any planet by a hundred thousand years, and has the weakest influence. The plant itself is challenging to see with a telescope because its surface is so dark.

    Nightmare is strange. Unlike most planets, this one seemingly has a consciousness tied to it that only those influenced by Nightmare can hear and understand. Despite the name, Nightmare has a motherly nature keen on protecting its children. Entities influenced by Nightmare take on the properties of a culture and nature, rather than a set type of creature. By culture I mean it may take on the appearance of a terrible omen of destruction that would bring despair to people who see it. Or it may simply terrify beasts it exists around due to its nature. Those affected by nightmare may be freighting in one place, but not so much in others without cultural context. Those born and influenced of nightmare feed exclusively on negativity, especially terror. This consumption isn't harmful to anyone; its the fear they cause.

    The planet itself is entirely "underground". Despite have a "surface", it's impossible to be on the surface. It's completely alien - anything not aligned with nightmare can't traverse it. Even if they had a guide born from nightmare they would still become lost, and eventually become a part of the planet itself, or simply consumed by the inhabitants. Light is scarce because it's literally consumed by the darkness; a strong and powerful light will do nothing. You need to be gentle with light, as gentle as you can. Dark vision does nothing here, because there is no light, heat, or cold in the first place, which is why most inhabitants have no eyes, or feel their surroundings with extra sensory perception.

    Outside of the nightmare, creatures born and influenced by it are weakened by light, or their power becomes non-functional. Some are even outright killed by sun or moonlight. All creatures of nightmare share a weakness to light, it is impossible for them to divert or prevent this.

Musing: Charisma (And other abilities)

 Man,

 defining ability scores is hard. 

    I want ability scores that can succinctly define an aspect of a character without leaving question to what it can be used for. Let's take D&D and Pathfinder for example using Wisdom. It defines both your ability to determine if someone is leaving out details they're giving... and... also the ability to perceive. What? How does my ability to discern lies also mean I can spot fine details with my eyes? I can see how if you bend it just enough to be something like "your observational power", which I can agree with if that's the case. Wisdom is also used to solve philosophical questions like what love is. But I don't like Wisdom is also used for Nature and Medicine. I get using Wisdom for Medicine is about piecing together things you have observed to create an accurate image of what's going on, but learning medicine is entirely about knowing what a body is made of and how it functions, which is entirely Intelligence. Intelligence is the ability to problem solve practical problems, like math. Imagine if your doctor knew you had internal bleeding (Wisdom), but lacked the knowledge of how to fix it (Intelligence), so they decide that they want to bleed you out so your body doesn't bloat from blood. Yikes. I wonder if using a combination of abilities together would make a more complete image.

    So what about Charisma? Here's an excerpt from my post about Thaumaturgy:

... "This problem is: What type of ability score can represent fate? My first thought was Charisma, but I like neither D&D nor Pathfinder's definition of it (that's a muse for another time). Charisma is defined as both your ability to interact with people but also your force of personality? Someone can be impressionable but be really bad when interacting with people. Think about an online user with a strong presence because they're anonymous, but would be terribly shaken and maybe even incapable of verbalization if forced to personally interact with people."

 

         I don't like how Charisma is presented within the game. But let me quickly touch on something: Ability scores within the game are simplified to keep things short. At least that's what I've noticed from my insight. It would be really crunchy if you had to keep track of 14 ability scores, more than half of which you likely wouldn't use.

     On the topic of Charisma, I'm usually not fond of how it's often used for attacks and spell casting. Why can the Sorcerer and Bard in D&D swoon magic to be cast at their behest? Of course, Charisma in that game also represents will power, so I'll let it slide. But what if Charisma was solely a people skill? This is where things can be fun. Imagine what type of character relies on Charisma for getting an attack in. Suave pirates and deceptive assassins come into mind. They still need precision, but by fooling their opponents they create an opening for themselves. That's really fun and flavorful! But why stop there? Let's look at spell casters!

    What sort of spell caster needs to fool their opponents? The schools of Enchantment and Illusion come to mind. It's not enough that you have the Intelligence to create an illusion with a spell, you need to control it to make it seem convincing. You can make a pot for boiling food but that doesn't mean you know how to cook. Thus, I am in full support for spells requiring different casting abilities, rather than being defined by your "class" (Sorcerer, Wizard, and so forth). What if a spell caster that used spells for plants and animals used Nature for their spell casting? They would naturally be amazing with Nature skill checks too.

 

Before I go, I would like to say one last thing about Charisma. I think Insight should be a Charisma skill, and not wisdom. It's a people skill. Investigation is the best non-person observation. 

 

- Red

Musing: Thaumaturgy

 Previously on: Psionics

    In my last post about psionics I briefly touched on thaumaturgy and how I view it. Just to refresh, I'll post its excerpt:

"All these musings leave a gap that needs filling: neither [psionics or magic] can affect a metaphysical property. Think about fate for a moment. Is that a physical property? No, you can't see fate. Maybe unless it's retrospective. What about a soul? This one is more in the air, but typically you can't see a soul unless it's a ghost. But even then ghosts are sometimes just lingering personalities that a dead body leaves behind. This leads me to my third and final idea: A source of power that affects the fate and soul of others and nothing else. I call this Thaumaturgy, and associate it with people who have a strong presence. Think about this for a moment: What marks the ability to change fate? Often it’s an outside force, like a divine will. But other times someone is simply so powerfully “them” that they bend fate around them."

 

    I came across this idea completely by accident and fell in love with it. It describes a source of power that is usually grouped with divine magic (but also other types of magic, to an extent). Problem is I'm not satisfied with something until I can categorize it's aspects perfectly. This problem is: What type of ability score can represent fate? My first thought was Charisma, but I like neither D&D nor Pathfinder's definition of it (that's a muse for another time). Charisma is defined as both your ability to interact with people but also your force of personality? Someone can be impressionable but be really bad when interacting with people. Think about an online user with a strong presence because they're anonymous, but would be terribly shaken and maybe even incapable of verbalization if forced to personally interact with people.


    My point is, if I define Charisma as solely the ability to present yourself to people, there may be another "ability" that represents a person's capacity to influence fate. Quite honestly, I haven't thought of an idea that makes me go "aha! That's it!". I thought perhaps "discipline" would be a good fit. It represents someone who is able to control their actions, and perform actions they don't want to do but must (have to get up and do those dishes. Sigh.). Discipline is also a great way to resist effects that attempt to forcibly control the person. So perhaps discipline is the best way and I'm just being a stickler for detail. It could be used to resist fate, because fate is trying to arrest control of your life.


    On the same topic, what is fate? I don't always define fate as a "path that everyone is guaranteed to take" or "the path a higher power has laid out". Fate means outcome, and at times a fictional character can change an outcome by simply being stronger than the outcome itself. Imagine a protagonist who is destined to do something, but ends up breaking that line. This is a common trope in eastern animation and storytelling in modern times. Deku from My Hero Academia comes to mind, but I won't spoil how; it's obvious when it happens. Within that same vein, fate can also bind people together, which is a fun narrative to play with.

- Red

Musing: Making Undead Hordes

 I love undead

    The idea of controlling a massive horde of corpses and bones is a badass image of power and control. Undead are typically my favorite type of monster from any media. But what about in a role playing game like D&D? Let's take a look.

The Subject

    Animate Dead is a 3rd level spell that requires no concentration that lets you target any type of corpse and turn it into a minion. If a high level player were to only create undead, they can have an actual army of minions, which is insane. Players can even gift them magic items if they don't require attunement, which makes them all the more powerful. Spellcasters can then mentally command them using a bonus action, which means they can still cast a spell on top of having an army. This is why I personally believe the Necromancer Wizard is a better damage dealer than the Evocation Wizard. Who cares if I can add my +3 Intelligence to the damage of a fireball when I can command 12 undead skeletons to fire at a range all dealing 1d6 + 2 damage? They even act as bodyguards and can prevent or hinder movement towards you.

 

The Problem

    Commanding 12+ minions is a complete slog when it comes to combat. Not to mention you have to roll both hits and damage for each and every one, while also keeping track of their individual hit points. That's an absolutely insane amount of extra work that removes from the badass feeling. It may be worth it to some people, but what about everyone else at the table? They're all waiting for you to finish your 20 minute turn.

 

Solution?

     Look. I don't have an actual solution, unfortunately. I would certainly like to find one. Wizards Of the Coast seems to try to solve this issue with new spell summon undead. I think it's a pretty decent middle ground, but there's an issue: I'm not controlling 12+ minions anymore, and thus there is no army. But what about the "Handling Mobs" section within the Dungeon Master's Guide? That's another good solution. It doesn't allow the necromancer to break the "action economy" nearly as easily and you still feel like you're controlling an army because you're rolling lots of attack rolls. You still need to keep track of their hit points, but could that be simplified as well? I don't have an immediate solution, but I feel there is. Even if you don't summarize their hit points, you've drastically reduced the time and effort needed to keep track.

 

     Within the future, I'd like to ensure this simplicity is a mechanic of undead within the tabletop game I want to make. It's not worth it if I don't feel like I'm controlling multiple undead.

 

- Red

200 Word Game: Helping Hand

Helping Hand

"This game can play 2-4 players, and requires cooperation and playing cards, representing the unequal footing people have in life that they have no control over. The game begins by assigning a player to one type of card (Clubs, spades, etc). Each player draws 3 random cards from their deck. These numbers are removed from the game.


The goal is for each player to make a line of cards that totals 25-28 as closely as possible, and to get rid of all held cards. When placed between two cards, these cards have the following rules: Queens subtract two card numbers from the total, kings add them together, and aces divide (rounding down). If you have a joker card, it belongs to everyone and it multiplies a number. Cards may be shared, but suites to the original player.


A game is lost when a player has more or less than 11. Not all games are winners, the goal is to support and problem solve with each other."

 

 This game I'm less satisfied with, but not all creations are game winners. What I do like is the thematic behind it, about how people are less fortunate than others. You could be missing critical cards needed to reach your exact numbers, or lacking the cards to help someone else. I never thought I'd be able to speak monuments of a story with just 166 words.

About Me

 Now that I've warmed up,

let's dive into more detail about my exciting life.

On my game side:

    My first table top game was D& D 3.5e. Going to be honest, I was a shitty player constantly trying to cheat and I had literally no idea how to role play other than solidifying me into a single trope that never changed. I went into a few games for 2-3 sessions before getting bored. My mind then was very scattered with too many ideas. That's still the case today but it was the same back then. I had a new character idea every single day, sometimes even 5 as I looked through the classes available to me. I had a bottomless hunger I couldn't fulfill and a very patient DM that tried their best to bend to my whim. Unfortunately I burnt them out, and their life took a negative turn. 

 

    Thus ended my interest in D&D until about 5 years ago or so. But I never stopped thinking about making my own game. In fact, it spurred what would eventually become a multi-universe world building project that I wanted to fit a role play game into that had a million options to choose from. The story of those worlds are still ongoing, by the way, and is worked on at least once a week.

    About 5 years ago a new coworker came into my life that has been playing since D&D released. The very first release. We talked for literally hours about the game, and he is an amazing listener that wanted to hear everything about my world. I'm sure you can imagine how long it would take to get through everything. He brought up D&D to me again and I checked it out: 5e was released just a year before he arrived. So we gave it a go, and I would use one of my universe settings that I had been working on more "recently" (about 7 years). Of course, I was the DM, and it was an extremely stressful position. I barely knew any of the rules and my friend forced me to come up with rules at that point and I would look them up later. This restarted my love for options, and thus I began brewing.

On my brewing side:

    Literally 3 months after starting 5e I decided my knowledge was ripe enough to start making my own content for my players to use. The Viper rogue was my very first creation. It was as bad as you'd expect, but the flavor was amazing. Unfortunately soon after I started brewing, my anxiety over being DM and doing live role play (I'm only familiar with online text RP) I had a severe and crippling case of embarrassment and anxiety from role playing. But that couldn't stop the literal tsunami of ideas and character options that would spur my 5 year journey that hasn't slowed down in the least.

    I would go on to homebrew a minimum of 3 subclasses each day for a full 3 years before I started to experience any burn out. Was I getting exhausted? Sometimes. My burn out rarely lasts longer than 2 weeks,. The worst I have is 1 month. By that point I was significantly more familiar with the rules and balance at hand. Was I good at brewing? No, lmao. I'm a slow learner - I have a learning disability, but more on that later. Was I getting better? Very much so. I didn't truly capture what making content was about until I created my Primeval Domain cleric. (Link: Primeval Domain) Creating a subclass was no longer about the balance of my content, but things that naturally led a player to role play their subclass. Within my cleric example, Primeval Armor was what defined my love for the subclass - everything else was just par of the course. It told the player how they can make their subclass feel more alive and not just a bunch of features with numbers attached.

 

 On my disability:

    I hate using it as an excuse so I don't bring it up in any conversations I have unless it's talked about. I don't hate the disability itself, I just hate that I feel like it's a poor excuse as to why I'm developing so slowly. My disability combined with my early upbringing of being an only child with no friends also forces me to think in very strange or obscure ways, but you wouldn't know until you've spoken with me for a long while as I've gotten better with social skills.

    Another issue I have is maladaptive day dreaming. If I'm not doing something that demands my attention I'm day dreaming. I day dream even while I need to pay attention. If a situation is extremely stressful, I force myself into a subsurface of imagination and block out the real world. This is really bad for me, but I feel more comfortable in life by removing myself from the boring, stressful world. I've been doing it since I was around 5 or so. The power and speed of my imagination is far more extreme than most people I meet. It even extends to my dreams, where I can see the lines on my palm, my finger prints, or the tiny rocks in cement (even the little sparkles are there). My dream world can also simulate the physical world with incredible accuracy (Though, not all of them do). Ensuring that my imagination closely follows the simulation of proper universal laws is very important to me.

On now:    

    My goal has never changed: create my own role playing game. The love and interest for that idea when I first played 3.5 hasn't dwindled. Not even a centimeter. The obsession drives me to use my maladaptive day dreaming to its advantage: rapid idea creation. And now that brings me to what I consider the second era. My first was when I discovered the Primeval Domain cleric, and now the second era is discovering that new information I have has re-contextualize old information, and now I feel as if I'm starting from the beginning again, and rediscovering my love for creation. I'm at my happiest when I have fun ideas to chew on. I want to create a game people love to play. Do I want to make money off it? I would be lying if I said no. But I want the content to be "pay what you want" because I know what it's like to not have enough money. If people want to make money off my stuff then I will demand it be "pay what you want", but they are free to do whatever otherwise.

Musing: Psychic Abilities and Other Powers

 Ugh

    Psionics is such a strange topic. Everyone has their own view of how it should work what what rules it should abide by. Some people have a very simplistic view that it's magic, but using your mind instead of a "spellcasting focus" (such as a wand, staff). Others pretends psionics is its own thing, but their view still ends up with it just being magic (telekinesis is just Mage Hand without the visible hand). No matter how these people define psychic abilities, I'm never satisfied because magic usually has no limit on what it can do, which makes it indistinguishable from psionics. Is there anything wrong with that? In the case of principle: No. In the case of narrative: I think so. If there's no "hard" mechanic to distinguish them from each other, then what's the point of calling it psionics? Take my earlier example of spellcasting focuses; if a person requires a mind to levitate an object, isn't their brain just a spellcasting focus? What about making a ball of fire? If there's no distinction of limit between the two then in my eyes it's all magic, no matter what the source is. (It's even more offensive if a person role playing a psychic needs to look up a spell but is required to pretend it is something else).



    Whatever their views are, I have my own which seems to be either in the minority of unique to myself: Psionics should only be able to affect the minds of others, while magic is restricted to the world they can see. This immediately creates a stark contrast that I love. If you recognize that your emotions are being forcibly changed, you instantly know a psychic is nearby. If you see a table hovering off the floor, you immediately know there's a spell caster at work. Doesn't this feel better? There is no guessing. Think about D&D; When you observe someone using smite, you absolutely know this person is at least a 2nd level Paladin. There is no mistaking it. What if everyone could use smite, just flavored differently? (I'm not speaking about smite spells.) Smite loses its "oomph" and becomes mundane. Imagine if other smite spells were Paladin only features; it would immediately become more distinguished. My point is: I love it when something has a hard limit.



    All these musings leave a gap that needs filling: neither can affect a metaphysical property. Think about fate for a moment. Is that a physical property? No, you can't see fate. Maybe unless it's retrospective. What about a soul? This one is more in the air, but typically you can't see a soul unless it's a ghost. But even then ghosts are sometimes just lingering personalities that a dead body leaves behind. This leads me to my third and final idea: A source of power that affects the fate and soul of others and nothing else. I call this Thaumaturgy, and associate it with people who have a strong presence. Think about this for a moment: What marks the ability to change fate? Often it’s an outside force, like a divine will. But other times someone is simply so powerfully “them” that they bend fate around them.


Anyway, thanks for coming to my musing! There’s plenty more to come.

- Red

The begining of the end

The Beginning

Welcome to my new blog! Here I'll be posting my constant musings about what I like and the development of my games. There will also be countless 200 word and 1 page games. This month I've decided to try and make 200 word games each day for one month.


I'm new to the place so I'm not sure what else to post. So let's begin with my first 200 word rpg!

Honor RPG

(6/4/2021)

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This game system is intended to aid people in creating a character by defining their honor, then testing their character in a group created scenario.


Character Creation

When creating a character, consider their spectrum with a quadrant. On one half, a person choose where their character falls between Rules and Freedom. How strictly do they honor laws and rules?


Next, a person chooses what spectrum their character is between Selfless and Selfish. A selfless character may sacrifice themselves no matter the consequence, while a selfish character may only perform activities with promise of payment.

You do not need to create a character purely of one option.


Scenario Creation

Next, players create a scenario so they may describe how their character interacts with it. The first player asks a question that describes a scene, and the next player to their right answers yes or no. Then that player asks, and the next answers. This continues until a satisfying scenario is made. If you can't decide on the amount of questions, ask a number of questions equal to twice the amount of players for a small group, or all players ask 1 for a large group.

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I'm very happy with this game system. It's purely role play and will help immensely in understanding your own character. Onto my next created game!

Conspire

(6/5/2021)

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Alert! There is a mole in the system trying to eliminate and steal technology! Each conspiring player is called a spy, it is your job to be the last remaining.


At the start of a game, each player writes down one object they see onto a card privately, then lays it flat onto a table. Then the cards are all shuffled into a pile and distributed. Players randomly choose who starts.


Each player then takes a turn asking another about an aspect of an object that may be on their card, such as shape or color. When a player believes they know the object, they call it out and both players privately show hands. If the player is wrong, they are eliminated; if they are right, the other is eliminated.


The game continues until there is one left, who wins the game.


Rule Variants


More people: At the start of the game, players can show their hand with another, forming an alliance. Players are eliminated when both allied spies have no remaining cards.

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Again, I'm very happy with the system. It feels a lot like if Clue and Eye Spy had a child. It's extremely flexible because you can choose any object within the area. It's really fun when I still have room to add variant rules.

Onto my last game!

Mastermind

(6/5/2021)

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The goal of the game is to outwit and fool your opponents by laying traps. The game requires blank or playing cards.


Each player receives 12 cards. Players choose which type of card is a trap and which are intel. When a player begins their turn, they pick any cards they have laid out and lay 6 cards in a line in front of them facing down, which is called a minefield. The minefield must have 2 or more intel cards. The player to the left must choose a card from the pile. If the player receives an intel card, they may stop their turn and keep the card, or choose another. If the player chooses a trap card, they must give the enemy player all intel cards they may have gotten on that turn, plus one intel of their own. The player to the right is next. A player loses if they have no intel.


The game ends after 3 rounds. Players gain 1 point for each intel in their hand, and 3 for each intel in the minefield. A player with the most intel wins, and must exclaim "just as planned!".

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The last system I've made that I was happy with. I've made two pvp games so far, so I think my next will be cooperative!