mnemex.bsky.social
Joshua Kronengold; software developer, sf fan/conrunner, game designer, musician, filker, harper, fiddler
1,157 posts
158 followers
93 following
Getting Started
Active Commenter
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Yeah, me too (I can play it adequately).
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I play on BGA! Not every day, since I've been getting back into chess a bit, but I log on every few days to play chakra, Thurn & Taxis, or something else that I can play quickly!
On with friends and a live chat somewhere else is the best!
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Start your own neighborhood FB page. Invite everyone on the page, individually. Freeze the jerks out.
It's the only way to work when the people who need moderation are also the moderators.
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Yeah. My ballot actually had Mandani 5th, so I contributed to Lander's margin, not the ludicrous margin he got in Sunnyside/Woodside. But, of course, I ranked him and didn't rank Cuomo, so in the endgame it's a vote for him because yay ranked choice/IRV.
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Or, I guess, he could see the polls (that I could not in fact see) and knew that Sunnyside was in the bag and canvasers were more or less pointless here.
A 50 point lead or better throughout my entire neighborhood. Well then.
Oh, gift link www.nytimes.com/interactive/...
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I mean, it could be. We're in a co-op, but I think the sponsor-owned apartments (and while the number keeps going down as the sponsor is able to sell vacant apartments) are usually stabilized, so it's not like there is nobody in the building it wouldn't benefit.
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I've gotten none! Apparently he likes Brooklyn more than Queens? (or maybe the queens canvassers got stuck in Astoria)
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Wait, three?
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People don't even have to buy all of it. Just buy lots around big areas of public land, then fence off the rest, enclosing public property they don't yet own. Sure, in -theory- they have to provide access, but....
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And I really like a lot of them. But Silvery Barbs is massive fun but everyone wants it (I've refrained, somehow), the weapon damage feats are tax feats, and the magic implements just raise the bar for everyone.
5e promises that you don't need magic bling. But who doesn't want a +2 sword?
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Yes, this. 4e is great to look at for this because it was so compressed; the first wave of books was filling the gaps (str paladin *cough* *cough*, but eventually it just gets to be a Lot, and then there's Essentials, which...who was asking for this?
5e, Strix/Tasha's is the tipping point.
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Just Advantage/disadvantage is arguably too flat; we saw that with the DNDOne playtest where they tried to make everything Adv/Dis, and..but what does the second support get to do? But it fits well into bounded accuracy and makes the first support you get really impactful.
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Yep! 4e was an improvement on 3e in many ways (not having 12+ different categories of stacking modifiers for each attribute was a good one) but with all the real time modifiers changing all the time, combat was math exercise.
But the Avenger mechanic was hella fun and became Advantage.
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Yes. The rough edges, lore, and anticipation of fun combinations and the resolution of achieving them is what makes it work, and different from a game like Fate or Good Society where the mechanics lead you directly back into the narrative.
But they're also why editions become glorious messes
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But "3 stats" meant that archetypes that doubled up on related stats were defensively weaker for basically no reason; you either need the feats that let you move one stat into another defense group (which works worse with 5e's fewer feats) or need to also give a benefit for investing in paired stats
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For instance, off the grid, Str adding 1ft to speed per plus would help melee characters stay relevant as higher tiers made the board bigger.
I also liked the "3 stats for defense" model and "6 stats" is stretched and some associations are forced (and Int doesn't get used enough)...
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Yes. They actually had some DNDNext ideas for making every stat matter, which would work better for every stat having a defensive use, but they dropped them--I've thought of putting some back in; you don't want "every stat is critical" but having every stat matter somewhat rewards player choice.
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I mean, or you just make a strength or dex fighter/mage who focuses on utility spells until their int builds up a bit.
It's weird how they pingpong "NO MAD" and "every stat should matter" with the editions, swinging between extremes as they go.
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I mean,to be fair, what you usually do is "I made a pact with The Lady of the Grey Flame (or whatever)" and then you lock in what they actually do for you later, but yes, the old approach was way more story-forwards and swapping in pact boon doesn't actually make the class much less front- loaded.
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Yup! They needed an answer to level 1 dips, but this one isn't ideal, and it only answers some dips, too--my bladelock just switched from hex blade to blade pact.
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We hit a similar problem with a player with a 2014 EK. Concept works, but 2014 EK is weak and the player also tried to dual wield. Both options are stronger in 2024, and can even actually work together, rather than entering bonus action exhaustion.
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Could also build a wizard with true strike who plans to take Bladesinger later (maybe sub in the 2014 elf for the proficiencies), but yeah, this is not exactly an easy build plan.
4e ironically made this one thing much easier--just take swordmage. But that system was so hard otherwise.
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Huh. So rebuild as bladesinger wizard, swordlock, or eldritch knight, then? It's so much easier to go from concept to character...at least, when the mechanical support is there.
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We have two warlocks (well, sorlock and one full warlock) in Spelljammer. Neither frequently uses eldritch blast. But they're both doing at least the bladelock thing.
I still think 2024 was a missed opportunity. All they had to do was have Agonizing Blast scale on single target attacks...
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This just makes me want to build a Str 8 paladin (obviously, you do this by going Dex and using a longbow/medium armor; you'll lose some AC vs a Str paladin, but partially make up for it by having a real ranged attack, stealth and initiative). There's also Cha/True Strike/Plate, but you only move 20
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We had one of those accidental on purpose "oops, I put too many encounters in and no long rests" days at that level, and the GM was watching my girl go and wondering aloud "is there anything artificers can't do?"
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It was a lovely pun! I mean, there's good reason to ignore artificer; they have lots of lovely specific bits and flavor but the result is meh at most levels. That said, 3rd level Artillerist and Battlesmith artificers, specifically, are some of the most busted things in the game at those levels.
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Oh, it's an entirely reasonable choice (as is giving people well-meaning, kind advice; I just suggested a build for a friend's 8th level ranger that would increase her str from 16 to 19 or 20 and wis from 14 to 15, losing nothing else; she'd botched the 2024 update and not taken an extra feat).
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Heh. Artificer is fully part of 5e, having official releases in 2019 and expanded in 2020 with the armoror. Earlier content that doesn't have newer versions is still valid in 2024 D&D. The 2024 update is UA of course, but the flamethrower turret attack is in both.
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Yep. NY does have FPTP after primaries, so sadly we still have to consider electability, but at least here we can vote our real preferences, rather than having to game even the primary level!
But the failure mode is, yes, Silwa somehow pulling off a win on NYC's 30%R if things fracture too much.
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Eh, Artilerist Artificer gets a 2d8 at will 15 foot cone attack at level 3...on a bonus action. Like Agonizing True Strike, it's an overpowered option at the level you get it, and levels off over time to eventually be underpowered at higher levels. Even slightly overpowered things can be ok.
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... This is D&D2024? Backgrounds are...where you get your stat bumps? And your starting feat? It's a sizable fraction of your build!
"Backgrounds are for downtime abilities" is both untrue and also very 2014.
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Yeah, writing code to handle truly large volumes of data is a discipline in and of itself, and if you haven't done it exactly right -or- if you're outscaled, by a big jump in data, you'll break, hard.
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Yes, but I'll also do a vibe check. Fail the vibe check and the random follow gets blocked. Pass/don't fail and I just won't follow back. I only follow back people I actually know IRL, or people who people I know IRL interact with frequently and who are clearly interesting, and not all of those.
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For me, at least, "reverse chrono" is really a proxy for what I really want -- read/unread markers on every post from someone I follow so I can have a sense of how close to "done" I am and choose whether to read thoroughly, skim, or skip ahead if I'm well behind.
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Maybe a view that showed me communities I might like and users I might know/like?
The other longstanding lj-model discovery issue is that is threads you've glanced at blowing up [that aren't yours/ replies to you]; some way to notice activity and either follow or ignore it would be nice.
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What would you add to Dreamwidth if you had infinite resources?
Looking at my self-imposed partial isolation on the site (I follow my friends and the few commuities I've found that interest me, read everything, and don't look for more), if I wanted to open up, I think I'd want...dunno.
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It doesn't, if you're the kind of person who likes pure chronological.
Pure chronlological people (like me) only follow specific people and read -everything- they post. Presuming that I'm typical (and since this behavior comes from Usenet/email, it's probably pretty typical), reposters get booted.
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It's tough to call, tbh. On the other hand, very few "anyone but Cuomo" people are going to vote Cuomo anywhere on their ballot.
On the other hand, just like 4 years ago there are a bunch of NY moderates who are going to be very leary of anyone to the left of Bloomberg.
It's gonna be an ugly race
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Yeah, happens. Solving with a partner helps, but solving on paper (well, text editor) is much more satisfying for me than the from the hip solves were; makes it more of a cohesive puzzle.
724 and 730 were still rough, though, and we only got through those by the skin of luck.
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And yes, did solve blue (which was last in our actual solve order); one we were down to those four it seemed really clear, and was.
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Connections
Puzzle #731
🟦🟦🟦🟦
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟪🟪🟪🟪
🟨🟨🟨🟨
We did ok.
Caught purple first, which made the rest of the puzzle easier...but also made it harder for us to guess the puzzle order.
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vs, voting ranked ballots using a point system tabulation, strategy is key--one stops listing candidates can drastically affect the outcome and impact of your ballot.
But the only strategy in IRV (past honest ranking) is dishonest voting, which is very dangerous/prone to backfires.