“Balance” gets abused a lot, as a term. It means multiple things, and it results in people talking past each other.

Intra-party balance – that is, everyone in the party being approximately equally capable – is important for most tables because most people resent getting clowned on by their so-called allies.

Creature/encounter balance is not about forcing the fights players get into to be fair, but about having a reliable way of telling how hard the fight will be. That knowledge is not an obligation to make the fights fair.

That’s dying. Bleeding out. It’s not even necessarily truly unconscious (even if it is Unconscious).

Trolls are only common if they’re made common, though. Like, they’re common in the Forgotten Realms, or Golarion, or whatever, but commonality is out the window in a homebrew setting.

“Don’t worry, it’s just a name!”

Gets attacked by trolls.

“I thought it was just a name!”

It can’t be “takes the Stand action”, though, because Stand reads “You stand up from being prone.” If your reaction prevents the targer from standing up, then they have’t actually taken Stand, just attempted to.

The thing is, preventing someone from getting up - especially someone with any amount of combaat training - involves a lot more than just standing next to them. You have to get your weight on top of them, and then usually attack or manipulate one of the limbs.

That is not an act that leaves you out of the way. It kind of means being on top of the target, at least while you’re forcing them baack down.

So, the Stay Down reaction kind of needs to be imagined as something that interferes with a strike that can be done without risking an ally.

In Narrarive Declaration’s Kingmaker 2e actual play campaign, their necromancer invites people to sign contracts to be brought back as thralls after they die, because informed concent is leagues better than doing it without concent.

Plus, he promises them health and dental.

Is this something communities could opt out of? Not everyone wants their community flooded with comments from people replying to people who aren’t even community members.

Bingo. Grades were ok? No scrutiny for you whatsoever. The fact that you’re being physicallly and emotionally abused by your peers to the point of being afraid to say more than 3 words to them, or anybody else, because you don’t kbow how to interact with them is not a concern.

You only get help, or even just context, if you’re causing problems for the adults.

It’s really easy so long as you a) start at level 1 or 2 and avoid building out too far ahead, b) build to a character concept rather than try to optimize mechanically, c) avoid options released in adventures. Oh, and d), understand that retraining is actually baked into the rules.

Adventure character content is less rigorously tested, and mostly amounts to professional homebrew. It’s often super focused on the scenarios presented in the adventute and significantly less applicable in general.

Focusing on mechanical optimjzation rather than character concept often leads to madness, since feats are generally well placed within the same power bands (there are few stand out or trap options). For a crunvhy game, it’s often best played descriptively.

Characters become mechanically more complex every level or two, so starting at higher levels can be very overwhelming for new players. Building out a higher level character means choosing a lot of feats, and often the utility of those feats is only really understood through play.

The grey one was the earlier model. You gotta get in on those mid-generation upgrades!

Nah. I fear uncertainty. I am 100% certain there’s going to be some social norm I don’t know and that everyone around me just groks.

Please. Do you think the grad student who is marking your essays has department printer access?

As someone with 9th grade Canadian core French from 25 years ago, this has not been my experience of the French at all. Not in France, nor in Quebec. What are y’all doing to their language??!?

Hey, do I work for you?

They’re not self-aware enough to understand they are shitty fathers. Narcissists can’t admit to fault or failing without taking mentall damage.

Shit, Succubus crit succeeded their Recall Knowledge check

Well, the good news is there are 3 more halves to get to!

Just downgrades the results a step, so it’s Oops, All Hits rather than Oops, All Crits.

I wonder if the upcoming release of SF2e opens the door a little more? Instead of “this is different, let’s try it” it can be framed more as “I’m excited about this new thing, want to indulge me?”

And then suddenly, Skittermanders everywhere!