SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

I don't even mind the bugs, but if I can get a mod to expand my inventory I would do that in a heartbeat. Every time I kill a dragon I get 100 pounds of bones

Bobby wrote: "I don't even mind the bugs, but if I can get a mod to expand my inventory I would do that in a heartbeat. Every time I kill a dragon I get 100 pounds of bones"

That's where having mods that let you run around with up to 65 companions (Amazing Follower Tweaks) and a horse with saddlebags (Convenient Horses) comes in!

Micah wrote: "Bobby wrote: "I don't even mind the bugs, but if I can get a mod to expand my inventory I would do that in a heartbeat. Every time I kill a dragon I get 100 pounds of bones"

That's where having mo..."

I have to say, multiple followers/companions is very tempting - I like doing the Companion quests, but I've given Lydia so many enchanted weapons/armor that she's really overpowered and it's hard to adjust back to how easily Aela dies in comparison.

But can you take things back out of your saddlebags if, hypothetically speaking, you accidentally take your horse over the side of a cliff and you survive but it does not? Not that this has ever happened to me...

Trying to complete one challenge in Opus Magnum per day. Also started wading into Legend of Grimrock.

I pretty much just live in Animal Crossing: New Horizons now. Also playing a lot of Breath of the Wild. I ordered a new Switch at the beginning of our stay at home orders so now I've got tons of new games to check out.

Does anyone else get the Pirates of the Caribbean theme song stuck in their head whenever they play too much Skyrim?

I'm playing Detroit: Become Human. A very interesting game indeed.

Kaa wrote: "Does anyone else get the Pirates of the Caribbean theme song stuck in their head whenever they play too much Skyrim?"

I will have to admit that I used to. but not as of late. Currently been playing through a game which I've got 300 mods and Playing Doom as well.

Finished Solitairica by beating it with each one of the characters. Epic mode was too long/tedious and too difficult for me, so that's that!

On to a couple of indies, one from a few years ago, one more recent: Dungeons of Dredmor and Forager.

DoD is a "roguelike" which suffers a lot from being choppy and sluggish and crashing now and then. But I'm enjoying my magic build and hoping that it will be able to beat the boss (which my previous most successful character completely failed at).

Forager I'd almost say was like Harvest Moon or Rune Factory, except "what your character is doing" seems to be ruining the world rather than working in harmony with it. The cute aesthetic makes it not quite as dystopian feeling as Factorio...

I’m currently playing Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and hitting about the 100 hr Mark. I can’t read so it’s sadly about the only thing I’ve been doing since this all started.

I know it’s an older game but I will say I think it’s a thing at least some of us here could appreciate. It’s bloody violent and the story is gut wrenching in parts so avoid it if you’re looking for happier times.

But- there’s lots of fun parts that actually are directly related to books we’ve read. You can wear Achilles armor or debate with Socrates... fly off a small cliff on the back of your Pegasus... it’s a blast.

I’m counting down the days for The Last of Us 2 though also. Which I’ve only been waiting for for about 10 years now.

Sarah wrote: "I’m currently playing Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and hitting about the 100 hr Mark. I can’t read so it’s sadly about the only thing I’ve been doing since this all started."

I'm sorry to hear you're having trouble, and hope your reading mojo comes back soon.

Thanks Beth! It’s definitely been a bummer. I tried reading when this all started and was actually thinking -“Great! maybe I’ll finally get to the backlog”. And then I’d read and my mind would just wander.

Don’t want to derail the thread or anything. But games have definitely been my go to outlet since it doesn’t matter as much if my mind wanders because my fingers are doing their autopilot thing 😬.

Sarah wrote: "I’m currently playing Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and hitting about the 100 hr Mark. I can’t read so it’s sadly about the only thing I’ve been doing since this all started.

I know it’s an older game ..."

Yes! I cannot wait for TLOU 2 to come out. So close!

Don’t look anything up about it online! There be spoilers afoot.

I’m actually super nervous to play it because I’m so attached to those characters. I just really need for this story to end with a little more hope than the last one ( but I’m not holding my breath).

I do think in terms of video game stories that TLOU has to be one of the best out there. I know when we reach the climax I felt like I was just left with this huge hole in my chest because it sort of forced you to question literally everything you’d just experienced. It’s rare for even a book to accomplish that never mind a video game.

Agreed with how powerful an experience playing The Last of Us was. I’m not sure I can take the stress of playing it’s sequel anytime soon, though. Its predecessor was so visceral and intense, and I’m trying to find ways to ease my nervous system these days.

Yeah Anthony I don’t blame you. I’m questioning myself whether I’m mentally prepared for it or not. I’ve just been waiting on it for so long that I don’t know if I’ll be able to help myself.

(Yes I am that person who burns herself on hot food because I don’t give it enough time to cool off.)

I had kind of a similar experience with Red Dead Redemption 2. I actually never played through to the ending because I wasn’t in the right frame of mind for it. Might not ever be.

I actually just recently started The Last of Us for the first time. I'm not too far in, but it's pretty intense. I started playing it the first night at like 11:00 PM and that was not a good idea. I woke my dog up from exclaiming in surprise a couple times.

Agreed that it's definitely some heavy stuff to be playing through right now, but I'm with you Sarah, I've been anticipating this for so long now that I'll be too eager not too. I'll just have to be extra kind to my mental health in other ways.

If it does get too heavy I’m sure I’ll probably put it down for a bit until I’m in a better place.

And Bobby- playing late at night is brave!! Lol. I don’t think I could do that. I am jealous that you’re getting to experience it for the first time. I’ll be sure not to mention any spoilers.

I did want to do a run through of the first game before starting the new one but I don’t think I’ll have time. Still feels like I have a hundred hours to go in AC:O.

Been replaying final fantasy 13. Good times

On Switch I've started Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition. It definitely feels like a fifteen-year-old JRPG, especially when it comes to the characters' outfits. :D (ETA: only ten years? wow) The remake is quite beautiful and the open-ish MMO style world has a lot of cool vistas to enjoy. I'm not sure how excited I'll be about doing generic quests for dozens of generic NPCs, but maybe I can skip a lot of those.

Learning to run Roll20 D&D games. I've been playing in one based on a hybrid between Pathfinder and a homemade class free system. However … well that game's up in the air right now due to the GM making a critical fail on his "sensitivity to current events" roll. (The key player who was hosting our email list, Google Docs character planner spreadsheet, and our Discord voice channel dropped out of the game and deleted those services.)

But my brother's learning to run Roll20 games as well and he's been hosting a slowly evolving low-level campaign as a test to see how best to run Roll20.

My own game will be based on the Basic Fantasy RPG system, an Old School Revival (OSR) adaptation of the original D&D system. The rules, monster manuals, modules and all are available for free online in pdf, or cheaply in paperback from various online vendors.

I'm conceptualizing it as a training game for people who have never played D&D and who aren't keen to buy into the whole Wizard of the Coast D&D franchise just yet.

… Not that I have any players lined up. I know at least two people I'd like to invite but I only really talk to them when we happen to bump into each other (unlikely now in this lockdown environment). I don't have any contact information for them. I'll probably just end up running it for people I know who have been playing D&D forever. Mostly just want to learn Roll20 and make some cool battle/dungeon maps.

So glad you mentioned rpgs, Micah! I played via roll20 a few times, it's not completely intuitive, but a cool tool.

I am playing in a one-shot of the new Alien rpg today. I'm the pilot and just volunteered to go on the cold ship we received a distress call from. Because what's the worst that can happen, right?

In my usual group, we just finished our Mage: the Ascension campaign and are now starting a Call of Cthulhu campaign.

Ines wrote: " I'm the pilot and just volunteered to go on the cold ship we received a distress call from. Because what's the worst that can happen, right?..."

Rule #1: Never split the party
Rule #2: Never volunteer. For anything.

Well, we did both of those, and now the only person who was staying behind at our ship just announced they would come and join us. Because that's just how you do it.
Sadly, we then ended on a cliffhanger. I'm looking forward to the next time. It was fun and the system worked well for me. (We are playing to test the game for a review our gm is going to write.)

Ines wrote: "Well, we did both of those..."

Well DUH!

Rule #3: It's no fun if you don't break the rules.

In one of my recent D&D games I had a party of 6 players fighting an endless wave of flying kobolds plus an ever increasing number of higher ranked reptilian critters, culminating in a gnome riding a (very young) dragon.

It was a set piece battle that they were not supposed to win. The dragon rider was supposed to kidnap the party's gnome magic user/healer (it's a class-free system and healing magic is just another realm of the spell system; there's no distinction between a mage and a cleric).

Anyway, the dragon rider does a Command spell: "SUBMIT!" And the player just barely made their save. When the player's turn comes he says "I'm going to pretend the spell worked and walk up to the dragon rider."

Everyone was like … "WHAAAAAAT?"

The dragon then tries to grab the player character (a gnome, but who at the time had magically enlarged himself to ogre size … which is quite funny if you think about it) … the dragon misses by a mile.

The player says, "I hold my arms up and say 'We'll help you if you help us!'" (The party had been stranded on an island and was searching for some way off.)

The dragon rider replied, "Then come with me!" And the dragon grabs the gnome, the gnome grabbed the dragon, and off they flew! The flying kobolds were called off. End of session.

Talk about splitting the party!

The cool part was that the player is the 16 year old son of a guy I went to college with. He's not really new to RPGs but his dad has run all the games he's been in and tends to run old school rules. So he was really unsure if going with the dragon rider was a bad thing … none of the old seasoned players would have done it. But he went for it anyway. That's the spirit you want in players. From a narrative standpoint it was the coolest thing possible. It opened a lot of new possibilities in the story going forward.

Wow. I’ve only experienced RPG in a small group, but yours sounds interesting!

… oops … 7 players. I broke my own "6 players max" rule when people signed up too fast.

We had 3 sessions and then got banned from where we were playing (someone somehow did bad damage to the hardwood floors and we lost wife approval -- not my house or wife).

Then I ran another game for 6 others. Then COVID happened and we're all online now. Moving this homebrew, class-free system to a VTT platform like Roll20 is non-trivial so I'm not sure when we'll get to play either of these campaigns again.

I tend to run big, long-term campaigns. I don't like running modules and really suck at doing one-shot or short campaigns. The stories just get too big.

Micah wrote: "So he was really unsure if going with the dragon rider was a bad thing … none of the old seasoned players would have done it. But he went for it anyway. That's the spirit you want in players. From a narrative standpoint it was the coolest thing possible. It opened a lot of new possibilities in the story going forward."

I love when players do these kind of things and contribute cool, new things to the story! I want my players to have an agenda and an impact on the world.

Ines wrote: "I love when players do these kind of things and contribute cool, new things to the story! I want my players to have an agenda and an impact on the world. ..."

Exactly. Active participation in world building and storytelling. That sometimes means making the unwise decision. Too many people are in the habit of playing "to win" or playing against the game master instead of with them.

In the exact same game when the party encountered the spirit of the daughter of their dead ship's captain, one of he players absolutely refused to talk to her because he was convinced anything I, the GM, threw at them was going to be a trick to harm them. I kept trying to get them to engage with her so they could figure out more of what was going on but this player just kept saying: "NO. Don't talk to her! We keep going this way!"

Eventually one of the other players got curious and started talking to her and … FINALLY … they could get more information and find out what their next quest was.

I guess some people have played in games where it was the GM vs the Players a few too many times!

I can recommend a GM-less tabletop RPG that gets people out of the "must win" mindset, at least for a while. It's called The Quiet Year: https://buriedwithoutceremony.com/the...

It is a one-shot game with an ending known before the game starts. The players fill in the story between the setup and the end. They can choose whatever setting they like. The official player count is 2-4, but I have played with as many as 7 without a problem. The physical game is on the expensive side, but I expect that the pdf version is within most budgets.

Games are a welcome distraction during these times as can't read/listen to books all the time or watch shows. Over the last 3 or 4 months, have several hundred hours in the Borderlands franchise currently playing 3 for the 3rd time. My favorite of the series. Last year it was the Assassins Creed franchise and see a few mentions of it in the thread.

Wish I could play Last of Us but restrict my time to Steam on PC. Oldest son is playing it but also uses Apple gear and because is family, I forgive him. I use Windows/Linux on PCs and did have an Xbox so taunts have been known to be traded.

John did you ever get to play the The Last of Us part 1? I’m going to try and start TLOU2 this week, but really need to wait until my 7 year old is not in the house.

Has anyone else started it? I know there were a couple others looking forward to it too.

My copy of TLOU 2 doesn't get here 'til Thursday. :( I'll probably dedicate a good chunk of Friday to it since I'm off work that day.

Micah wrote: "I guess some people have played in games where it was the GM vs the Players a few too many times!"

Or, sadly, in games where they weren't allowed to do anything not planned by the railroading GM. :/

We had our 2nd session of the Call of Cthulhu campaign yesterday, then I have another regular group that plays 7th Sea where I'm the GM. And my other Mage: the Ascension group, where I gm as well, will start meeting again soon. That's about as much as I can handle.

We tried to find players for a short campaign of Feng Shui, but for a few years now people seem to be only wanting to play DnD and DSA (the most famous German fantasy game) or Shadowrun. Every GM who wants to play something else doesn't find players, but we constantly have people coming and saying they are searching for a game they can join. Which is too bad for me, because I don't like DnD and Shadowrun and am not interested in DSA.

Just completed Cuphead!!!!!

Are there any board game geeks here who’ve played Terraforming Mars? It was given to me last year, but I didn’t crack it open until a couple of weeks ago, and I think it’s amazing. I’m also a huge fan of Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars Trilogy, which was a big source of inspiration to the designers. My fiancé and I have been playing a lot of very tight matches, and not one of them has been remotely the same. It’s a deep game, and each one ca take a while to complete, but I highly recommend it for people who like richly conceived, complex but accessible board games.

Terraforming Mars is a popular one in my friend group! Really glad you're enjoying it--I don't think I realized it could be 2 player. Looking now I see there's even a solo mode! Cool! Finding 2P games can be a challenge.

Sarah wrote: "John did you ever get to play the The Last of Us part 1? I’m going to try and start TLOU2 this week, but really need to wait until my 7 year old is not in the house.

Has anyone else started it? I..."

I don't have and don't plan on getting a PS so can't play until they come out with a PC version. The oldest son I mentioned said he started 2 last week and likes it a lot.

I've been playing The Elder Scrolls Online for the last two months now and every other weekend I play Shadowrun via Discord with my regular pen & paper group. But we've been doing that online even before the plague, so nothing changed there.

We also have a slightly less regular Savage Worlds round in which we play kind of a "Legends of Tomorrow" scenario where our chars stay the same, but we keep getting thrown into a different place, time or even reality after every adventure, which is a lot of fun and leads to a nice variation. We've moved that online for now, too.

I have Terraforming Mars and enjoy the engine-building a lot, but don't get it to the table as much as I'd like because of the playtime length.

Terraforming Mars is definitely a favorite in my house. We actually have the colonies expansion showing up later this week, which I can't wait to try. I love the base game and I love all the expansions we've tried so far. I also have the app on my phone, I'm that addicted to it.

Last Of Us 2

It’s nice to find other Terraforming Mars enthusiasts. In a post-pandemic world I hope to find other folks to play with.

Broke out a few board games during the stay at home quarantine. Coincidentally one of them happens to be Pandemic. Other favorites include; Scotland Yard, Formula D (we had a season of 12 races), Ticket to Ride and Apples to Apples.

I have never played Terraforming Mars, but it looks really cool and it has amazing reviews everywhere. Will have to check it out, thanks for mentioning it, Anthony!

Tianna, Betrayal at House on the Hill is one of our favourites around here, too.
We also love to play Robo Rally and Skull Tales, a pirate tabletop game I am obsessed with since I got it from the kickstarter.

Tianna wrote: "My job involves using a computer 8 hours a day, and while I enjoy my job, sometimes I just don't want to look at a screen to play games lol!"

I totally understand you! It's the same for me.

My interest in Terraforming Mars was piqued by the comments that it could be played by just 1 or 2 people, and then the game itself sounded intriguing, so I got a copy from the local comics store today, along with the Turmoil expansion. (Also Marvel Fluxx because I have a soft spot for both Marvel and Fluxx.) Will update soon once we've had a chance to try it!

Oh yay!! I love that our group might add not just to TBR but also TBP!

Allison wrote: "Oh yay!! I love that our group might add not just to TBR but also TBP!"

...but is that really a good thing, though? :D

Just kidding, it is. I want to get the game now, too, but it's really expensive over here right now and the comments say it was cheaper before, so I'm going to wait for a bit.