I’ll be sure to mention it! Appreciate it

Yeah this is the one.

Hm, the first session I ever ran I had this mentality. The session would entail meeting in a tavern, talking to the locals to gather info on a nearby tournament, and get ambushed on the road by undead. I had listed out every bit of XP that my players could earn along the way, plus a little over in case they did something cool. Both combat XP from killing monsters, as well as passing planned social and exploration checks and player-initiated social and exploration checks.

It was hell. I had a spreadsheet on one screen checking boxes to automatically add stuff (so as easy as it could be), for even the smallest stuff possible. The XP was shared as well, so I wasn’t even counting each player individually. The very next session I decided I’d start doing narrative level ups instead.

The problem with XP systems, especially the ones like Elder Scrolls which levels skills through use, is that it adds a ton of homework to the DM. On top of prepping encounters, quests, maps, NPC’s, oh-shit situation scenarios, etc., doing XP is a bit much, at least for me.

Part of the entire reason I moved away from DnD was the level up system. Savage Worlds is much better in that regard, since on an advancement players can upgrade combat skills, social skills, exploration skills, or gain the equivalent of feats (or remove what would amount to anti-feats) after an important story beat - all from the same point pool. So, an advancement could be achieved after a particularly important conversation or exploration event, and result in non-combat skills being upgraded.

Hm, appreciate it! I’ll look into it.

Might’ve been, but I don’t remember it being so red. I’m on mobile right now though, and my PC browser loads everything in dark mode, maybe the colors were affected.

In any case, the site my buddy showed me ranked games according to performance just like that one so that one would still be useful.

One of my buds is a programmer and runs linux and windows on his machine. At this point he’s pretty adroit at fixing any issues on linux, but he has faced limitations before.

Regarding work, being on linux apparently was a big plus when he got hired, and works exclusively on linux due to its stability.

Regarding gaming, many games we play apparently run better on linux (inc. ArmA Reforger and some others, I forget), but some will just not run at all (anything with a kernel anticheat), and his mic sounds like utter shit on discord due to missing drivers or something.

I do remember there was a site where you could check how well a game ran on linux, but I forget. You might be able to check if the games you got run on steam deck, since they are linux based.

Shit. What if you are running the home edition? I’ve been thinking about switching as well, but I don’t have a background in coding and I’d have to run a dedicated ssd with windows just for my work programs (design related) or migrate to FOSS completely.

There’s this belizean hot sauce called Marie Sharp’s, I get the gold one. Doesn’t sting me at all, my family can’t handle heat, but it does the job well enough.

My favourite however is Salsa Macha. Can’t get dried pepper where I’m at though, or I’d make it myself. Goes great with just about anything, even compound butter slathered bbq steaks.

Running through the most golden wheat field I could’ve ever imagined (I swear I’m not a british PM), on the side of a hill that went on to the horizon. Behind me, hauling ass, was the mystery machine with no driver. On top of the mystery machine was Cliff Burton, Bo Bonham, and Jimi Hendrix playing purple haze. I woke up as I stopped running and just started floating.

Either that, or the time I dreamt I accidentally killed a romantic partner in my sleep in a huge hotel that looked like something out of Brazil. As I woke up (in the dream), the bed was covered in blood and the police was banging on my door. I pushed an armoire into the door frame, broke a window, and jumped out. Then I woke up.

Oh, I had thought it would’ve been expensive as hell. Guess that it comes down to how built up you have your kit, I guess.

Oof, isn’t airsoft a money sink as well?

Yk, this is the ONE time living in the ass end of nowhere has been good for my wallet.

I’ve wanted to paint minis for a while now, and the one mini I got is a small blueberry I haven’t even painted because I’d need to buy the tools and paints, which aren’t sold here.

If I were stateside I’d be drowning in orc and salamander minis. Or more likely yet, primed but not painted, and tossed aside like half the hobbies I pick up until the moment I got the jist of what its about.

Wdym, all landlords are already leeches!

Zgrok is a good alternative. Used it some months back for Foundry vtt.

In addition to what others have said, I’d recommend two things:

1. Deliberately understalt food. You can always add more salt on the table, you can’t take salt away.

2. Prep compound butter beforehand with someone helping you taste. Grab roasted garlic (2-3 heads), red wine vinegar (a couple drops), 400g of good quality butter with no added ingredients (eg avoid garlic butter bars), handful of fresh chopped thyme and rosemary, and bit of pepper and salt (same thing as before, underseason). This will give you an already prepped flavour bomb to add to savoury foods. I usually add a couple bones’ worth of marrow as well, and the resulting butter goes well with any meat (non-fish), vegetables, bread, even plain rice.

Puuure pazaak

Second. Performance should probably be better (I was struggling before I upgraded), but it is great fun. Very, very dark in subject matter.

Oh yeah. They added contextual interaction promots. The closest thing I had played before reforger was DayZ though. But Reforger is very intuitive. Most everything can be done by looking at stuff and pressing F (entering cars, bandaging wounds, taking on and off attachments on weapons, etc.).

It’s a bit more complex than Squad in the things you can do, but the approach is much more simple (like, in Squad you press f1-8 to switch seats, in ArmA you can freelook and look at the seat).

Great rec. Teamwork required, easy to learn but hard to master (especially the vehicles, which also require teamwork).

Honestly squad is pretty strange for me. I’m not very fond of talking to people (SzPD at least, might be on the spectrum), but Squad does not work without teamwork and communication. Guess the difference is that I don’t really get casual communication but effective comms on Squad rely on briefness and exactness. Triple Ds, that kind of stuff.

If you do end up jumping into Squad, expect some hiccups. The game is not terribly well optimized, and the community almost always picks the same factions and divisions. The devs have shown off a UE5 upgrade that’ll be dropping in the near future, so that might be good.

In a similar vein, ArmA: Reforger is great. Completely replaced my Squad addiction. While Squad is more focused (which is good), ArmA is way more free and varied in objectives. Plus, I feel like it might be more easily moddable. WCS and RH feel almost like they were vanilla, while the most polished Squad mods feel like mods. Not a knock against the mod teams, maybe unreal is harder to mod.

5 bucks says the grifters will say it is a deep state conspiracy