Recent content by Celebrim

Very close to what I imagined except that I imagined the ranks extending up 1 higher level than you, so E Rank was 2-4, and D rank 5-7. However, I have no idea what the exact scale is, I only choose that because I was in my mind highlighting just how useless the weakest possible E rank was for...

Without the Chosen One aspect, it's basically just "What if World of Warcraft (or insert your favorite MMORPG) was in the real world?" Which is kind of just D&D where the setting is taking the gamist tropes of an RPG and making them simulationist within the setting, which is something that in...

Although it isn't obvious, it appears Solo Leveling is actually a Science Fiction setting, and the magical beasts are just aliens who have been previously conquered by the "mana" givers. I don't think the "gift" of mana to humanity is in fact anything but a trap, as it's the means by which the...

Given the prices that pros would charge. Would you consider a starving college student working/studying in graphic design? Her internship work and other professional pieces are probably at the level of detail you are looking for.

I'm just about at the point where if a company makes an over-the-top anti-AI statement, I think I'll just boycott them. I can't imagine using AI in its current form unedited for any creative purpose, but on the other hand, some of this comes as performative Luddite crap. I use AI to brainstorm...

Note that to a large extent this controversy among the sages has to do with whether you treat Gygax's write up of the assassin as primarily focused on the assassin as NPC (hiring one to perform assassinations and spying) or treat the assassin as PC. While the assassin shows up in the PH, I...

While I have always allowed backstab to multiply the bonuses, I'm pretty sure backstab explicitly says somewhere that it only multiplies the damage dice of the weapon.

I seem to remember playing that way back in the day and thus basically never getting off a backstab, but the 1e PH book is written in a way that surprise is optional for the backstab, and I think that's more reasonable and so I've also made that explicit in the revision. It would work then more...

I ran 3e for like 15 years, and ranged sneak attack is obviously inferior to melee sneak attack because you can always melee sneak attack by flanking, whereas ranged sneak attack requires surprise and to be within 30 feet of the target. One of the subtle jokes of "Order of the Stick" is the...

Oh, they are absolutely both, and that's true of high level play as well. Assuming they survive the low levels, which like the M-U they probably wouldn't, they turn into something that can either kill what they are facing outright in one round or else are absolutely useless against it. As an...

No. In fact, they have nothing really do with each other. I think the requirements of a backstab are basically you are behind the opponent, while the requirements of an assassination are you've achieved surprise. A backstab benefits from surprise but doesn't seem to actually require it...

Oh, it gets worse. Because it is so broken as written it has to be hard nerfed in secret in the DMG requiring a full half-page of clarification and restrictions on their core mechanic. But to make matters worse, that hard nerf depends on an extremely fiddly comparison with the target's weight...

In the write of the revised thief, thieves can take the Sniper NWP to do it.

It doesn't help that its mechanics are terrible. It's everything that is wrong with early D&D design wrapped in a toxic package that is worse than the sum of its parts while carrying a bunch of fluff along with it.

It sounds like you'd do well surviving my games. When playing a PC, the thing you should be asking is, "How is this character going to die?" and be mitigating against that. For example, it should cross your head in chargen, "What happens to this character if they fall into deep water?" If...