Oh I’ve taken that into account, lol. Things will happen in the story even if the players aren’t there to see it, because of faction Clocks (though those will tick if the players do things in quests that would benefit any of the three factions, not through time). I think I got my bases covered with enough brush strokes that I can spin up some bullshit to bring it all back to the main story if necessary.

And yeah, I see your point. I’m doing that, though, lol. Besides the enemy mobs which I’ll need for/if they decide to go a random cave or something, I’m only doing stuff I’ll need in the first 5 sessions. Maps, characters, and narrative aid artwork that might/will be used afterwards will be done then. Most of the stuff already done will be reused later (unless the players decide to start killing people out of the blue), but they might see all of that stuff early on, barring one or two characters.

This. I like DMing for ttrpgs, and I love drawing and painting. You’d think I’d be extatic about prepping homebrew and assets for a digitally run Savage Worlds campaign set Tamriel (or a weird homebrew mix of cyberpunk and vampire the masquerade), the truth is I’m more than just a bit burned out.

I want to start the campaign now, and I’ve had the story and characters ready to go for a month now, but prepping all those art assets has been tedious. So far I’ve done about 20+ tokens, 5+ maps, 15 character portraits, and some 10 general purpose pieces to aid narration. I got about 7 tokens left and I’m done, and I can barely get one out a day, every other day.

The worst thing is I have a very clear idea of what I want the campaign to look like and I’ve already made concessions by using RPG Engine to design my maps instead of doing it all by hand and just retouching it later. I don’t want to make any more concessions, so I’m SOL.

This is so relatable. I attended a school that gave its students a ton (and I mean a ton) of homework, because idle hands are the devil’s workshop (ugh), and I struggled the moment I couldn’t coast through without studying. Then went on to a college with a very similar work structure, and the same thing happened, except this time I quit after failing an entire trimester’s worth of classes. Some time after I enrolled into a different college that had a more hands on approach and I aced nearly every class.

Every trimester we’d have to enroll to a class which would have only one assignment, and you’d start working on it on day 1, and present results on the final day before a panel. The workload was much greater, I had less guidance, and it lead to a more trial and error approach than a step by step guide, but I’d never felt more comfortable or happier in an academic setting. Previously I had thought school just wasn’t for me but it was all in the approach. I just can’t do piecemeal busy work.

Yeah. I struggled to finish my graduation thesis, for many reasons, but chief among them was that I took on a project I didn’t know I wasn’t prepared for (it went way, waaay beyond what my education gave me, including economic and social issues I definitely was not prepared to explore, nevermind explain) and my supervisor was as inexperienced in it as I was. Me being the perfectionist that I am, being unable to produce what I imagined meant I’d rather do nothing.

Took me about 2y to get a decent research paper together (it really didn’t need to take that long, it was a qualitative study on gentrification in my city), and by the time I was able to guilt myself into actually finishing it, I got a decent looking project in about 2 weeks, hyperfocusing through the absolute rage the entire thing was giving me. The terna (experts assigned to judge) loved it, from the research to the execution. I asked for the degree to be handed to me on site instead of through a ceremony. I was just absolutely done with it, lol.

I don’t really feel proud about it even though I should be, I’m just glad I got through it at all.

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.

Was it? It was my understanding that one was another game.

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

Yeah, however, leaks around this have been a bit more believable than before. Can’t remember the specifics, but more concrete stuff has been found by datamining (iirc) deadlock and paying attention to steamdb, with less reliable leaks ranging from the game or assets (again, iirc). So, there’s a fair chance this is real.

However, HL3 has been real multiple times before, it has been cancelled many times apparently, only to be taken up again later on.

Fact remains however, that Valve have been working continuously on an appid that isn’t deadlock for some time now, and there’s plenty of noise around them working on a new half life.

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

Both of these recs are honestly great, Jojo Mayer in particular would be great as a theme if I slow it down some. Thanks!

Thanks! Skeleton Quarter and Jü sound like what I’m after. Hopefully it won’t be too dissonant for my table.

Speaking of music, has anyone found anything that resembles a mix of jazz, techno, and punk? Hell of a mix, but I kinda wanted something cool for a campaign I’ll run in a custom setting, in New Orleans. At this point, even something with an energy similar to Samurai or Atari Teenage Riot but jazzy would be cool as a “soundtrack”.

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

Definitely. I love the freedom ArmA gives. It allows to really engage with any objective as you see fit. The structure of a typical AAS or RAAS match in squad doesn’t really allow for that to happen.

The day before yesterday a buddy and I managed to round up 4 people to come with us to retake Cabin on a WCS server. W After that we went to Chotain. While the team took farm, we went on to take Laruns, then quarry while the team took Camurac, and then Penant’s . We went from losing Military Hospital to the enemy team struggling to even field helicopters to the western coast.

Haven’t ever gotten close to that in Squad. Though I will say that rounding up enough volunteers to do that is kind of hard.

I never played ArmA before Reforger, but coming from Squad it feels great. From my understanding of common gripes long time ArmA players have with Reforger, it’s a bit less milsim, so take that into account if you want to jump in.

Vanilla:

• Mortars
• New MI-8 and Huey variants, armed.
• New Soviet and NATO IFV (NATO has an amphibious IFV now, similar to the BTR)
• Rank requirements for weapons and apparel
• Point capture changes (can’t respawn on contested points, and capture rate depends on how many friendly points connect to it).
• Structural destruction (eg: buildings and trees)

WCS (probably the most popular mod pack along with RHS) also has new stuff coming with this patch:

• New weapons
• New vehicles (inc. Mh6 variants, tanks, new IFVs), some of which are armed with new stuff I think.

Lethal Company, Battle Talent, Ready or Not, and Arma Reforger. Bit of Stalker GAMMA and Crusader Kings as well.

I’m halfway through my first kcd2 playthrough and I’m waiting for the barber update. The game is fantastic, and I really want to keep playing, but I kinda liked costumizing henry in the first game. Looking at the rest of the game, I imagine this one’ll be much more polished.

Not OP, but the community used to be so much better before. Game is fun, begun playing it on launch, but quit about three years ago because the people that play it are pretty toxic nowadays. Also, can’t trade stuff now. Some people really enjoyed that aspect of the game (not me, but still). A shame there isn’t anything else like it.