Not-So-Mith'd Opportunity: Random Banter # 222

[Mystic Muse]

I am still on season 14, and it almost feels like they are starting to have to stretch to keep going.

....Starting? they've been stretching for a WHILE.

[Anonymouswizard]

Week I'm watching Episode 2 of Stranger Things. Eleven just has that 'I need a hug ' look.

It at least makes a change frm wowing my friend is going to lose her leg.

[Teddy]

Which, to be honest, is part of the intention. Along with the need to somehow justify a rabbit able to hop at speeds of at least thousands of meters per second (I haven't quite decided if he should live up to his name) being given a voice for playability purposes. There's also the implication that people in-universe were expecting such a loophole, as if some have been found before and used to perform unethical experiments. Probably on some highly intelligent animal that went on to successfully get the definition of 'mutant' changed.

He still doesn't understand a lot of society, like why the Chief Human tends to be male, but he's working on it.

But yeah, the idea is that the backstory carries the tone of the character while still making enough sense. This is a bunny that fights crime by tackling people really fast, it's an inherently silly concept (although that can could still be played very seriously in the right group).

Would probably not have been overly out of place in the Mutants & Masterminds campaign I was in. We had The Rat, who was a mutated rat who blew poisonous needles at people and never failed to run from a fight, and we had The Weight Watcher, whose primary goal in life was to collect memorabilia and take selfies.

[FinnLassie]

I mean he apparently is so better start watching! Unless you mean specifically his episodes which, entirely fair and fine.

God how the **** is that show 15 seasons.

Oh, it's definitely the only episode I'd like to see. :P


ION: Exciting couple of weeks coming up! Tomorrow I'll be once again registering and guiding scouts to their groups and planes for World Scout Jamboree (held in West Virginia!), my birthday's on Wednesday, the coming weekend is Ropecon, largest non-profit RPG convention in Europe (I'll be at the info desk and running a game of Pirate themed Fiasco), and then first of August my boyfriend's taking me to see Spamalot the musical!

[Anonymouswizard]

Would probably not have been overly out of place in the Mutants & Masterminds campaign I was in. We had The Rat, who was a mutated rat who blew poisonous needles at people and never failed to run from a fight, and we had The Weight Watcher, whose primary goal in life was to collect memorabilia and take selfies.

I've found Mutants & Masterminds is great, but only when everybody is on the same page. In one game I was in the GM didn't know the rules and was trying to run a super serious 'superhero has turned villain and rules the world' campaign, but with a group made up out of anime references. There was also an idea that complications didn't really come up, and required the players to put in a lot of work to have more than one Hero Point a session (also a hard cap of 10 on all Stats and Powers, which really limited builds). The heavy handed railroading didn't help, and neither did the tantrum when the GM didn't get to read out his prepared speech because we'd decided to explore the environment for clues.

The other was much more of a parody with a strong rule on Western-style superheroes only, but ended up far more focused on the characters due to constant use of Complications and Advantages to move outside the standard superhero plots and find ways to resolve things. Sir Hopsalot would fit right into that group, officially the group 'mascot' his character arc is about trying to understand human society and become a more useful team member. It's inherently silly, but not significantly moreso than many actual superhero characters, and serves a massive role as the group's scout (high Athletics, Acrobatics, Stealth, and the speed to lterally run across a decent sized city in a combat round) even if I can't spare the points to be truly combat-capable.

[Insane Jeenyus]

....Starting? they've been stretching for a WHILE.

Ok, to be fair, when Dean was possessed by alt-Michael, from that point on, maybe earlier.

Week I'm watching Episode 2 of Stranger Things. Eleven just has that 'I need a hug ' look.

It at least makes a change from wowing my friend is going to lose her leg.

Keep going!

[Anonymouswizard]

Keep going!

One of the things that annoys me though is that the kid's miniatures are primed but not painted. I mean, I'd understand bad paint jobs, I'd understand partial paint jobs, I'd understand only some of them being painted, I'd understand bare pewter(/plastic? I don't know if plastic minis were a thing in the 80s), but they've clearly been primed with black paint. It's just one of those bizarre cases of minor details that you begin to fixate on.

[Insane Jeenyus]

One of the things that annoys me though is that the kid's miniatures are primed but not painted. I mean, I'd understand bad paint jobs, I'd understand partial paint jobs, I'd understand only some of them being painted, I'd understand bare pewter(/plastic? I don't know if plastic minis were a thing in the 80s)

Not that I remember. I think all figs were pewter.

but they've clearly been primed with black paint. It's just one of those bizarre cases of minor details that you begin to fixate on.

as a guess: they may have had only had a limited amount of time, and not enough to dry a non primer coat.

[Teddy]

ION: Exciting couple of weeks coming up! Tomorrow I'll be once again registering and guiding scouts to their groups and planes for World Scout Jamboree (held in West Virginia!), my birthday's on Wednesday, the coming weekend is Ropecon, largest non-profit RPG convention in Europe (I'll be at the info desk and running a game of Pirate themed Fiasco), and then first of August my boyfriend's taking me to see Spamalot the musical!

Ooo, fun! I have two co-workers heading off to the Jamboree, and probably a bunch of other people I know but aren't in touch with. I don't think my cousins are going this year, seeing how they'll be coming up here to Ancestral Farm later tonight (or tomorrow night, if I misremember). Probably just as well, we almost lost one of them to the last one in Japan...

I've found Mutants & Masterminds is great, but only when everybody is on the same page. In one game I was in the GM didn't know the rules and was trying to run a super serious 'superhero has turned villain and rules the world' campaign, but with a group made up out of anime references. There was also an idea that complications didn't really come up, and required the players to put in a lot of work to have more than one Hero Point a session (also a hard cap of 10 on all Stats and Powers, which really limited builds). The heavy handed railroading didn't help, and neither did the tantrum when the GM didn't get to read out his prepared speech because we'd decided to explore the environment for clues.

Isn't hard cap 10 pretty much how the rules suggest a party of upshoot-but-competent superheroes should be created? Except complementing stats should sum up to 20, and I guess hard-capping those creates pretty bland characters... And, uh, I hope you had a good reason to ignore the prepared speech, because what superhero ignores a prepared speech?

For us, our complications didn't really come up either, probably primarily because there wasn't time to deal with those as well during a 3 hour session, but I didn't really feel like I missed out too much; they look hard to GM properly. We could always have used an extra hero point during most sessions, but that made them feel valuable.

My own biggest grief with the system was that it didn't favour improvisation for the sake of looking cool (compared to e.g. Feng Shui). In one case, we fought a mist-ghost pirate on board a 17th century galleon, and my character was knocked overboard in the first round and had to spend several rounds making it back to the fight. On the way I spent a little extra time bringing along a cannon, loading it and firing it at the pirate, hitting against all odds... only to find out that it made a pitiful amount of damage, not at all enough to break through the pirate's toughness. Everyone agreed that it was awesome, but my impact on that fight was truly inexistent. One other thing that bothered me was that it was a little too easy for the GM to accidentally create characters which are more or less immune to all the players and at the same time have terrifying attacks.

The other was much more of a parody with a strong rule on Western-style superheroes only, but ended up far more focused on the characters due to constant use of Complications and Advantages to move outside the standard superhero plots and find ways to resolve things. Sir Hopsalot would fit right into that group, officially the group 'mascot' his character arc is about trying to understand human society and become a more useful team member. It's inherently silly, but not significantly moreso than many actual superhero characters, and serves a massive role as the group's scout (high Athletics, Acrobatics, Stealth, and the speed to lterally run across a decent sized city in a combat round) even if I can't spare the points to be truly combat-capable.

Yeah, that sounds like a perfect fit for a zany character concept played semi-seriously.

[Insane Jeenyus]

***edit***
ION: Exciting couple of weeks coming up! Tomorrow I'll be once again registering and guiding scouts to their groups and planes for World Scout Jamboree (held in West Virginia!), my birthday's on Wednesday, the coming weekend is Ropecon, largest non-profit RPG convention in Europe (I'll be at the info desk and running a game of Pirate themed Fiasco), and then first of August my boyfriend's taking me to see Spamalot the musical!

about 300 miles NW of where I live! Careful, its been hot this year.

[LaZodiac]

Oh, it's definitely the only episode I'd like to see. :P


ION: Exciting couple of weeks coming up! Tomorrow I'll be once again registering and guiding scouts to their groups and planes for World Scout Jamboree (held in West Virginia!), my birthday's on Wednesday, the coming weekend is Ropecon, largest non-profit RPG convention in Europe (I'll be at the info desk and running a game of Pirate themed Fiasco), and then first of August my boyfriend's taking me to see Spamalot the musical!

Oh man that sounds awesome! Have fun Finn!

[Anonymouswizard]

Isn't hard cap 10 pretty much how the rules suggest a party of upshoot-but-competent superheroes should be created? Except complementing stats should sum up to 20, and I guess hard-capping those creates pretty bland characters... And, uh, I hope you had a good reason to ignore the prepared speech, because what superhero ignores a prepared speech?

There's no real hard cap (although I've seen some products treat 20 as one), everything is officially allowed to scale to inifinity (which is how brute forcing interstellar travel works, you hit FTL speeds at around 38 ranks). The only catch is that to-hit and damage must average no more than the series PL, and that your paired defences must average no more than the series PL. Which is why Toughness Tanks are one of the dominant builds, while I personally prefer Dodge/Parry builds an opponent with an autohit attack can destroy you.

For us, our complications didn't really come up either, probably primarily because there wasn't time to deal with those as well during a 3 hour session, but I didn't really feel like I missed out too much; they look hard to GM properly. We could always have used an extra hero point during most sessions, but that made them feel valuable.

Trust me, Complications coming up completely changes the game. With a broad spread most PCs should be inconvinienced by a Complication once or twice a session, which really reduces the feeling that you have to horde those Hero Points. My group gave everybody their responsibility, one really broad complication (everything from 'doesn't understand human society' to 'causes lots of colleteral damage*'), and one relatively narrow one, although we all ignored having a secret identity as we all knew it was unlikely to come up.

* That caused a lot of problems as the character was locked in perpetual lawsuits.0

My own biggest grief with the system was that it didn't favour improvisation for the sake of looking cool (compared to e.g. Feng Shui). In one case, we fought a mist-ghost pirate on board a 17th century galleon, and my character was knocked overboard in the first round and had to spend several rounds making it back to the fight. On the way I spent a little extra time bringing along a cannon, loading it and firing it at the pirate, hitting against all odds... only to find out that it made a pitiful amount of damage, not at all enough to break through the pirate's toughness. Everyone agreed that it was awesome, but my impact on that fight was truly inexistent. One other thing that bothered me was that it was a little too easy for the GM to accidentally create characters which are more or less immune to all the players and at the same time have terrifying attacks.

On the first count, the problem is how quickly the game scales past human-scale fighting. A PL character with a pistol and +17 in Ranged Attack: Firearms as well as Power Attack can theoretically contribute in a fight against suitable enemies, but as the game continues to scale that maximum 8 Damage effect just won't cut it against enemies that focus on toughness, either bring supertech or go home. (Close combat weapons don't suffer so bad, but work best on a Brick trying to save their PP.) I think the one firearms-based character I was considering at a time utilised a suit of powered armour to carry a couple of rocket launchers and gattling guns into the air and then used Power Attack to boost their damage up to brick-harming levels. Improvisation can be done, but you hace to start looking at other avenues (enviromental destruction is a favourite of mine).

The bit about the GM being able to create characters which are more or less immune to the PCs, that's more to do with how the system is unbalanced, and adversaries meant to be a couple of PLs higher than the PCs. I remember the group spending about fifty minutes trying to take down one Hulk expy, eventually settling on 'fly directly above it and pelt it with lightning/lasers/rocks', before later on discovering they were mass produced (the GM actually upped the rate of PP gain so they'd be less impossible and introduced smaller hulkmice).

Yeah, that sounds like a perfect fit for a zany character concept played semi-seriously.

Yep, really wish that group wasn't split across the country and Germany.

[Bartmanhomer]

I'm trying to lose weight. Is Keto any good to lose weight?

[Mystic Muse]

I'm trying to lose weight. Is Keto any good to lose weight?

Talk to a Dietician or other licensed professional.

Make sure they're licensed and not a snake oil salesman.

That's all the advice we can give you. Anything beyond that would violate the rules against offering professional medical advice. Especially because dietary needs differ wildly from person to person.

[Bartmanhomer]

Talk to a Dietician or other licensed professional.

Make sure they're licensed and not a snake oil salesman.

That's all the advice we can give you. Anything beyond that would violate the rules against offering professional medical advice. Especially because dietary needs differ wildly from person to person.

Ok thank you.

[LaZodiac]

When I get really tired I, at times, message people stuff in my sleep. This happened last night.

Submitted, for your amusement.

Spoiler: Broken up or not, LaZodiac is still LaZodiac

Show

LaZodiacYesterday at 11:57 PM
Blue :heart:
I'm in love with youo :heart:

Blue GhostYesterday at 11:57 PM
Are you okay, Zodi?

LaZodiacYesterday at 11:57 PM
yeah
there was a problm ewith some of t stuff so we wentto check it out
thus why I showed p on the TV

Blue GhostYesterday at 11:58 PM
It sounds like you're not awake now.

LaZodiacYesterday at 11:58 PM
Ia'm very tired yes, sorry xP

Blue GhostYesterday at 11:58 PM
Let's get you to bed, and we can catch up tomorrow?

LaZodiacYesterday at 11:58 PM
yeah :heart:
Good night love :heart:

Blue GhostYesterday at 11:59 PM
Okay~
Goodnight Aya~

LaZodiacYesterday at 11:59 PM
AGoodnighnt Blue :heart:

Blue GhostYesterday at 11:59 PM
Sleep well~

LaZodiacYesterday at 11:59 PM
You're thebest and I love you so much~

Blue GhostYesterday at 11:59 PM
You can tell me all about it tomorrow. :smiley:

LaZodiacYesterday at 11:59 PM
okay :heart:

[Anonymouswizard]

I'm trying to lose weight. Is Keto any good to lose weight?

Eat less, exercise more. That's the basic formula, can't really gone more advice beyond 'see a Dietician (not a nutritionist)'.

What I can say is that medical professionals said to me 'avoid using weight loss medication if you can, it can have nasty side effects'. So yeah, talk to professionals before doing anything beyond diet changes and increasing the exercise you do.

[Insane Jeenyus]

Talk to a Dietician or other licensed professional.

Make sure they're licensed and not a snake oil salesman.

That's all the advice we can give you. Anything beyond that would violate the rules against offering professional medical advice. Especially because dietary needs differ wildly from person to person.

I approve this message

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Talk to a Dietician or other licensed professional.

Make sure they're licensed and not a snake oil salesman.

Obligatory (even if the joke only works, AFAIK, in the UK). Skip to 3:54

{scrubbed}

Grey Wolf

[LaZodiac]

I utterly despise how my mood can go from "literally bawling over my loss" to "frustratedly angry at people having stupid opinions" in like an instant.

I want off this ****ing roller-coaster ride to hell.

[Bartmanhomer]

Are genderless considered to be non-binary?

[LaZodiac]

Are genderless considered to be non-binary?

You're missing the person "people" or "person" in there. "Are genderless people/ are people who are genderless" is what you'd want.

Also yes, binary gender is male/female. Genderless is none of those, ergo non-binary.

[Bartmanhomer]

You're missing the person "people" or "person" in there. "Are genderless people/ are people who are genderless" is what you'd want.

Also yes, binary gender is male/female. Genderless is none of those, ergo non-binary.

Sorry about that.

[LaZodiac]

Sorry about that.

Don't apologize, that was me just correcting some grammar not like, a bad thing you did! Just me throwing in my two cents while answering your question.

I just know you've asked us to correct you on typos/poor English before, if I recall, so I was doing my part to assist.

[Bartmanhomer]

Don't apologize, that was me just correcting some grammar, not like a bad thing you did! Just me throwing in my two cents while answering your question.

I just know you've asked us to correct you on typos/poor English before if I recall, so I was doing my part to assist.

I've remembered that a few random banter threads ago. Now that I've been using Grammarly more than six months ago.

[LaZodiac]

I've remembered that a few random banter threads ago. Now that I've been using Grammarly more than six months ago.

And it has been working! You're doing good.

Like with a novel, once you sort out the basic skeleton, it's time to work on the specifics. Working on your English is the skeleton, little corrections here and there are the details. Putting meat on the skeleton, so to say.

So yeah don't apologize it's okay. You can do this *thumbs up*




sorry if this came out of nowhere I'm super depressed today.

[Mystic Muse]

sorry if this came out of nowhere I'm super depressed today.

Is it because it took you 10 hours to get pants in Final Fantasy XIV, and my character got them almost immediately?

[LaZodiac]

Is it because it took you 10 hours to get pants in Final Fantasy XIV, and my character got them almost immediately?

I really, truly, genuinely wish it was, Muse.

I saw a motivational thing from th... the one guy who does those really long talky comics about depression and how the world is weird and how Nikelback is bad, and it made me think of Blue so hard I broke down crying.

[Bartmanhomer]

And it has been working! You're doing good.

Like with a novel, once you sort out the basic skeleton, it's time to work on the specifics. Working on your English is the skeleton, little corrections here and there are the details. Putting meat on the skeleton, so to say.

So yeah don't apologize it's okay. You can do this *thumbs up*




sorry if this came out of nowhere I'm super depressed today.

I'm so sorry to hear that. I hope you feel better.

[DataNinja]

I really, truly, genuinely wish it was, Muse.

I saw a motivational thing from th... the one guy who does those really long talky comics about depression and how the world is weird and how Nikelback is bad, and it made me think of Blue so hard I broke down crying.

It sucks how brains are like that. For a good time you can go without thinking of sad things... and then you get a sharp stab of a reminder out of nowhere. I know the feeling, even if not out of that exact situation. I wish I had some helpful things to say, or good advice, or anything... but the most that I can honestly give from experience is that time will help, eventually. But every person, every situation is different, as is what might help.

I'm sure there's a bunch of people here, though, that'd be willing to listen or help if that's needed, without being in a place close to your personal life or anything to judge.