Gotta say, harping on someone’s daughter for reading crappy fan fic based on a crappy movie, while bragging about someone who is writing crappy fan fic based on a crappy manga, is lame and pretty hypocritical… Great show otherwise guys!!

Admittedly, listening to Chris squirm about the aformentioned fan fic was fun. Also, I am totally loving the Wayne’s Awkward Confessions(tm)… totally awesome.

Its been ages since I’ve played a character with an animal companion. I used to have a wizard with a red squirrel familiar. I had to spend a bunch of exp to get it and I loved it. What did it do, mechanically speaking? Nothing. She sat on my wizard’s shoulder and squeaked snarky comments about the other characters (which they, obviously, couldn’t understand) when they said something dumb, causing him to snigger to himself at very inappropriate times.

God I miss Zathra the squirrel…

Heath… thanks for the support. Those bastards love nothing more than to beat an old man

Heath, I’m equally ashamed of Dawn. ;) She’s a good writer that has a following, and we’ve been pressuring her for years to forge out and write something other than fan fic.

Arg… I hate the “I don’t need the rules to support my Roleplaying” argument. I can’t agree with Chad, mechanics should support the character; it is a game and nothing ruins a character concept faster than not being able to mechanically do what supports your what or who your Character is.

If your game does not support your Roleplaying then you should play another game.

Well Dan, it seems you’re all bitchin’ about a drug while Chad’s livin’ with a dealer…

Well, I’m glad my “Remove Gypsy Curse” skill worked so that this one could get out ;)

On another topic, you discussed some ideas about having a character come in and being so much more OP than others in the party, but what if it’s a continuous game where players come and go and you don’t really have the option to start new characters at the level of the party? How do you prevent your big baddies from smashing the newbies? How do you keep the big ones entertained? In other words, I’m looking for tips for balance.

I know it’s not exactly analogous, but I run a LARP that is part of a larger group of LARPs. We can’t start new players above 2nd level, because that’s where they start across the country. (They used to start at 1st, but that was too low.) Yet, at our last event we at least 10 players (our of 30) above 30th level, which is about 10 times the power level of 2nd.

Usually we try to achieve balance by splitting up the NPC and plot crew, but it was too sparse to do so this time (5 full-time NPCs, only 2 of them experienced), and we found that it was slow for some PCs while the others were involved in plot. Mostly, there was not enough for the low levels to do, and some of them felt slighted.

I know, in most tabletop campaigns (and in isolated LARPs) you could just say that new characters start at 10th level or something like that, but if you’re playing a game that must balance with other games, that’s not really an option.’

Just a topic I thought you might be able to bring up in a future episode.

Thanks,
Matt Taylor
Mid-Level Crisis Podcast
http://midlevelcrisis.dalantia.org

Animal companions/familiars, etc. are a character ability, IMO. Not an NPC.

Something about Chris complaining about NEEDING the mechanics to reflect his character is incredibly amusing.

Heath: It would seem you’ve already read my work and didn’t enjoy it, I’d love to hear what you have to say about how I can improve since you didn’t leave a review or a critique.

Dan: :P I have a couple of projects going, but who knows if they’ll ever see the light of day.

Dawn:
My apologies for calling your work “crappy”… It was not a critique of your work, as I have not read it. I just found the grief that the group heaped on Chris’ daughter for reading fan fic (which they seem to bash rather brutally on more than one occasion) to be rather hypocritcal when following it up by bragging about your efforts in…….. wait for it…….. FAN FIC!!!!
You have my regrets for dragging your endeavors into my comments about what truly is just buddies ragging the hell out of buddies. I did find the whole situation quite humorous, as their group reminds me of my friends and I. When a drop of blood makes it’s way into the water, the sharks swarm. It was just me giving them grief for the grief they were giving.

I love the show, I love the people on the show, and I’m sure that to know you and your work is to love you and your work.

Even if it is fan fic.
haha.
Heath

I once played a half-elf beast-rider (kit from Complete Fighter’s Handbook). Loved that character, as he was bonded spiritually with a white tiger. This created a character flaw, if you would call it that. If a choice came up between saving his friends or his tiger, he would save his tiger.

I also played a wild elf beastmaster (2e kit). This was a real beastmaster with multiple animals, not one of those dumbed-down one-animal versions we see in d20. Never had a balance problem, but then again, I knew not to push it. The DM could be brutal!

One thing about class-based systems…Sometimes, they offer ideas on cool things to play. Things we may not have considered before.

I think the one issue that causes problems with the class vs classless systems is power balance. The James Bond character is not a first level spy, nor is he something that a classless system would be able to create right away.

So if your concept is that your character is that he is a bond in star wars, then you need to have the game master agree that as you level you can add skills that your character already knows and just hasn’t had a reason to use yet.

The second point I would want to state is that most class systems allow you to customize your character a bit. So the class does say you have X abilities, but how you use them or how your character behaves is up to the player. If your character acts in a way consistant with his own background rather then a way that is a min/maxed use of power then you win.

(Yeah, this is late, but I have been listening to your show for about 2 years and I’m finally getting caught up.)

Normally if I post on these comments, I try to post something amusing under various different names. This time, however, I’m really quite angry.

Quite simply. How dare you?

I can’t believe that people within a section of society like this that constantly has to explain their hobby to people that don’t understand and see it as adults ‘playing pretend’ has the temerity to blast the hobbies of someone else. What’s wrong with fan fiction? By your own admission people enjoy reading some of it enough to become fans of various authors, officially published or not.

Seriously disappointed in you guys.