TL;DR: However you choose.
If you read my blog, and read my blogroll, you'll find game summaries for a number of GURPS games centered around DF and fantasy gaming.
If you read all of those summaries, you'll probably notice that we don't all play DF the same way.
Which of them, if any, is the "right" way?
Obviously to me, the answer is all of them.
We all seem to run DF differently.
And it's all good.
I really do enjoy reading summaries of games that run differently than mine. And none of us are wrong to run our games the way we and our players find to be fun.
I may get the last word, sometimes, either out of sheer willingness to keep hitting "Reply." Or because I often turn my own game material into books of monsters or rules. But it doesn't matter for those games.
That's a great thing about gaming. Even so many years down the line, if the way I run and enjoy games is or isn't like the ur-games of Arneson and Gygax, whatever. We've taken the ball and run with it and we're enjoying it.
What prompted this? Just me thinking about how my commentary about Death Vision and Unfazeable here and at the Castle Whiterock summaries might be seen as criticizing a game. It's not. It's clearly a fun game that the players enjoy. I just want to engage in the connection a comment affords, and try to make my own game better by seeing what I'd find to be issues before they come up. It's not really me vs. another GM, or our game versus their game. It's purely constructive in intent.
All of that said, the correct way to play Eyes of Death is as amoral haters of everything who lurk in places with good vertical retreat room and plenty of cover vs. arrows. Anything else is wrong. Otherwise, we're good.
DFW is the 4th realish DF game I've joined and none of the 4 have gone the same way. And DF is just a small subset of GURPS.
ReplyDeleteThat last paragraph is great and reminded me of: “Heroquest is the best game ever made, and anyone who says otherwise is wrong!” https://youtu.be/Cx8sl2uC46A
ReplyDelete'All of that said, the correct way to play Eyes of Death is as amoral haters of everything who lurk in places with good vertical retreat room and plenty of cover vs. arrows. Anything else is wrong. Otherwise, we're good."
ReplyDeleteSorry chief, you're clearly missing the line "Encased in a glasssteel armored ball rendering them impervious to arrow fire."
Maybe so, but it requires adding a lot of things - glasssteel (from D&D) and enchanting that since it's otherwise going to sit on a ST 5 eye, for starters . . .
DeleteBAH! It's just Fine Invisible Epic Plate* of Weightlessness... which makes it 13 pounds, DR 9. DR 11 if you add underlayered Fine Invisible Giant Spider Silk* of Weightlessness. DR 13 if we add Invulnerability (and why not, we're already being a total dickmove GM with this excersize, right?).
DeleteIt takes the weight to only 15 pounds... Hey! That's an Eye's Medium Encumbrance max! Pretty sure we can toss Defending on there, we're already cheat- err, improvising our butts off anyway, may as well remove that -2 Enc penalty to Dodge by giving it a +2 DB....
And the best part? The armor is practically worthless†, unless you have an ingenious PC who hoards it away for the day he talks you into letting his "Elder Thing Summoning Cultist" Wizard take an Eye of Madness as an Ally.
* I figure body only as an Eye doesn't exactly need arms, legs, or helmet...
† I did appraise it at 50% of regular value as a 'curiosity piece' for them selling it. As you can guess from above however, it went unsold...
GM note: Don't ever do that. Especially then don't let them keep it. Triple shot especially don't let teh Wizard Player talk you into letting him become a Crazed Cultist of the Elder Things and eventually gain a summonable Ally Eye of Death after you've forgotten he's stashed away the Invulnerable Armor of the Eye.
DeleteAll that really does is make them very vulnerable to a No Mana Zone, where right now they reign supreme.
DeleteAlso, I'm not the sort to let folks a) armor an eyeball or b) talk me into anything. Although it would be funny to allow an Ally Eye of Death. It'll show up and kill the guy who wasted his points . . .
Also, Eye of Madness?
'Although it would be funny to allow an Ally Eye of Death. It'll show up and kill the guy who wasted his points . . ."
DeleteIt was great fun for all until he failed his Reaction Roll and it attacked the party and he then failed his Banishment rolls... and then it was fun for me...
"Also, Eye of Madness?"
I meant Eye of Death, though an EoD that blasts out madness rays would be cool...
Says the guy Adventuring with an eyeball headed elder thing that just got invited to take a room in his building....
ReplyDeleteJareth Mooncalled is entirely sane*. He really does hear Elder Thing voices talking to him. Even when Elder Things are actually there. And what they say always comes true.
Delete* For various definitions of 'sane' which (for him) includes 'mildly crazed from lack of sleep due to having Elder Gods in his dreams'. Like, straight up in the dream, having discussions over tea.