Out of curiosity, I asked Google Gemini if I should use AI more. It said:

The short answer is: yes, you should explore using AI more, but you should do so strategically and thoughtfully.

Which, of course, still favors using AI more without necessarily knowing much about my current use. At least this answer suggested careful and deliberate use rather than wanton.

I finished the puzzle #578 (9x9) in 11 minutes, 41 seconds in One Up Puzzle. Try to beat me! https://oneuppuzzle.com/

Crossherd #225 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛️🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛️⬛️🟩🟩🟩 Time: 0:39 crossherd.clevergoat.com 🐐

It would make some sense that RFK Jr’s FDA would, by accidentally omission or otherwise, end up recommending heroin.

One minor problem is that life as we know it is supported by the continuous input of energy from a nearby star. Without it, no photosynthesis, and nearly all primary energy production in Earth life comes from that.

The slightly bigger problem is that by the time there are only black holes, there are no planets. Because, you know, there’s only black holes. So nothing outside of black holes for life to be on, and the vacuum of space isn’t really the most conducive to life or interaction of any kind.

Screenshot of the free part of the article:

I’m that weird exception about character death, partly because I like building new characters, and partly because I like seeing characters get cool ends. Like my low-mid level bard who, while the party was on its last legs in a boss battle, leapt at the dragon’s face from an elevated position to attack at its face, mouth, throat, whatever he could get. IIRC, that bard and the dragon both died from that choice.

Edit: The campaign was at that point based in a small-medium town in a cold region. I remember the town had like 4 notable families, ones whose names meant something to folks in the area, and my bard was of one of the upper couple ones. So his death was definitely storied, crazy Uncle Artanis who died saving his friends and the region from a dragon.

My replacement character was a half-orc cleric who had trouble figuring out how to respect both halves of his heritage, and, in a big BSOD moment, rather than execute the defeated members of an orc tribe who refused to change their ways, he cast off his magic gear (armor, weapons, rings, whatever he had) and just walked off into the snowy forest, never to be played again. Which was just the only action I could imagine for him; he had “life” inside my head, and it was what “he” chose (I do not have DID).

That was 15+ years ago, and I only recently decided that he ended up forming a community of outcasts, people who couldn’t find a place in the world, and sponsored conscientious adventurers. I like to think that tribe of orcs, if they survived, at least respected his community and didn’t try to raid it.

[The sapient dagger] was a 1d6 but let you attack again, but rolling a 5 or less on the die makes you insane because the dagger insults the user so badly for missing. [… T]here was no cap on how often you could attack again.

You’re right about the extra attack, of course; I was too tired to remember or to go back and read again before commenting. I think we’d need a few things clarified before properly balancing an alternate version:

1. Rolling a 5 or lower on the extra attack’s attack roll, or its damage roll? Presumably either way it refers to a raw die value.

2. “No cap on how often you could attack again” - no cap on uses per day, or could you just make additional attacks within one round until you decided to stop (or died)?

3. Does using the dagger’s additional attack take your bonus action, or is it a free action? This may be answered by #2, since if it’s unlimited per round it must be a free action.

3a) If it’s essentially a free action, does it get included with a class’s Extra Attack? Which is to say, does it count within the activation of that ability for the purpose of anything that might positively (or negatively) impact all the attacks within a given activation of Extra Attack? (Of course, it wouldn’t make sense for it to have to count AS one of the class’s Extra Attacks, since it would be categorically worse as it would just invoke the risk with no compensating benefit.)

Hey, bending to the pressure of the public instead of the pressure of the government is still the WAY better choice here, and it’s good to see any media outlet taking that choice (against facism).

I re-read greater restoration, because 5e was never really my game (3.5), and saw one of its uses was explicitly to end one effect reducing your hit point maximum. So I’d amend my earlier and say yeah, that spell works. Since my reading is that it’d only reverse a single crit fail’s penalty per casting - not to mention the spell has a smallish material component cost (100 gp diamond) - the weapon wouldn’t call it cheating, per se.

As the dagger’s main thing is that it’s a 1d6 instead of 1d4, that’s only +1 point of damage per hit on average. 1 in 20 hits backfires, so essentially the cost for 19 extra damage over 19 hits per penalty taken, reversing just the one with a 5th level spell… there’s better ways to do 19 damage with a 5th level spell, so probably not really cheating :)

Correct if I’m misremembering the general benefits of the sapient dagger.

That’s certainly not great, but this show has way worse.

Pathfinder 2nd edition’s rogue class has an ability chain that allows them to have already bought certain kinds of item, and they declare it while on the adventure already and decide they need it. “Oh yeah, I bought a spyglass when we were in that last town.” The lowest level is for adventuring gear-type stuff, and it’s usable like once per in-game week. Later tiers of it expand the kinds of items and the frequency. You do also mark off the gold the item would have cost.

Riffing off the ring:

The Hand of Holding. When held, it can hold items for you and allow to use them with whatever ability you would normally have. Technically helpful in slightly extending your reach, and depending on the niceness of the GM may also mitigate curses or other effects that are triggered by holding the item, since you technically aren’t. You are still essentially wielding, using, and various other verbs-ing the item, so those still hamper you.

Oof, that periapt of health. Contract everything you can, then chuck it at an enemy. What a grenade.

Oh boy, now we run into the problem of “there is no such thing as a neutral universal spatial grid/position”. Since all position is relative, perhaps pressing the button locks it in place relative to the sun instead of the planet? Maybe this special version is marked with a sun symbol, if you’re lucky.

Also note that Immovable Rods typically have a maximum weight or Strength check that can either cause them to deactivate or move them or whatever. 8,000 pounds and DC 28 Str come to mind from one or another version, so this probably wouldn’t tear through the whole planet, but it could still rough up some buildings and moderate rock.

I’m pretty sure that’s already standard for anyone happy to use a wand/rod of wonder after they know what it is.

So a bag that’s bigger on the inside but doesn’t link to a pocket dimension. You could also go with the items being shrunken while inside, in that Ant-Man-ish “the space between the particles is reduced, and all mass is retained” way. If the bag breaks, the items revert to normal size.

Alternatively, rolling a 1 makes you roll the damage against yourself, but it’s a permanent loss of max HP as a psychic effect. It kills you if you hit 0 max HP. Anything that would let you recover the max HP, like straight-up wish (greater restoration isn’t good enough) also makes the dagger not work for you any more because you cheated.

It adjusts the depth map where you walk to appear as though something footprint-shaoed has sunk into the floor, as if in thick mud. Regardless of the surface - stone? still looks like someone sank into it a bit. When they run their hand over it, the floor is actually smooth as if nothing had happened, but the depth map makes it look like it.