Basements & Beards- Analogue Gaming Thread

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

"Current" rules? BT hasn't really changed all that much in all these years, though there's now also Alpha Strike for quicker matches (which itself is really just their BattleForce rules for large-scale combat, scaled back down to regular BT scale and ditching hex fields).

New releases regularly appear among DriveThru's Top 10 bestsellers (of the last x days). Kickstarters for new box sets (and especially the new miniatures) also do well.

(Atm the top 10 also include an adaptation of Fallout and SCP of all things. Whelp.)

[Kugelfisch]

Okay. I don't follow Piss & Peepee gayms much.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

You can thank the BattleTech writers for that. They have this autism going on where they insist that any 'Mech (or other vehicle) record sheet you've ever purchased should stay forwards-compatible, even if a rewrite might be sensible (the earliest WarShip statblocks were written before they had any WarShip construction rules, which eventually left the old designs undergunned and with a fuckload of cargo space).

Actual rules changes are mostly fiddling around here and there, with the greatest changes seen in more of the optional stuff. The newest addition was a more abstract alternative to handle artillery and air support.

Of course there's also the old HeroClix spin-off, but we don't talk about that one.

[wulfenlord]

But the Clix system is the future! Today! And who could forget the success of the first Mage Knight system. It crushed GW, so they sabotaged it themselves :3

Anyhoo, right now I'm digging those weird WWII settings like Dust 47 & Konflikt 47, I'm just a sucker for sovjet Tesla tanks & Wehrmacht Zombies lul (also if EA would licence a Red Alert tabletop I'd throw my money at that, too)

[Guest]

Konflict 47 is warlord games, so enjoy GW prices for shitty bendy resin.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

It's probably easy enough to find cheaper minis elsewhere. "Weird War II" games are a dime-a-dozen. You just aren't taken seriously in this industry unless your Nazis have zombies and/or mechs (who are always historical tanks with legs instead of - or in addition to - threads, because making Not-Zakus would be too far out there, I guess).

And now for another nuggest of lulz:

Dungeons & Dragons - The Problem with Ravenloft

So 5th edition is doing pretty darn good, dominating sales and for course virtual tabletop avenues.
Sure, one might argue that the rules and released books are a bit sloppy and underwhelming, but just like in the world of video games, being objectively terrible has never prevented D&D - and many other popular systems - from becoming a smash hit.
It probably also doesn't hurt that "D&D" is the most well-known IP in the industry, and that Wizards of the Coast can finance organized play and RPG podcasts with their Magic: The Diddling dollars, not to mention the pony dollars from daddy Hasbro.

Now, two business practices of Wizard's are probably the most troubling for 5e:

Campaign Settings

For the longest time, 5e has only really supported the Forgotton Realms setting (as featured in roughly 90% of all D&D video games). This is pretty annoying if you don't care about Realms, especially considering 5e's slow release schedule, and especially if you're one of those sad bastards whose favorite official setings hasn't really gotten any support since 2nd edition / BECMI days.

They've eventually shat out books for Eberron (a magitech setting from 3.X days with airships and not-robots) and Ravenloft (more on that in a bit), but they've also triggered people with gimmick-y shit like setting books for the Critical Role podcast (even though they've already released a book about their setting themselves) and various realms from Magic (which is unprecedented as they used to be wise enough to not cross the IP streams).
Now a possible solution for this dearth of setting support could be the DM's Guild, an alternative to the OGL for 3rd party publishers that actually lets them use official characters and settings (whereas everything in the OGL has to be setting-agnostic or homebrew). Unfortunately, you are only allowed to write shit for settings which Wizards has greenlit, which so far only includes stuff they've released books for themselves.
Essentially, they are preventing people from releasing 5e material for settings they don't really care all that much to begin with.

The Rise of the SJWs

Now it's no secret that Wizards has been firmly taken over by SJWs, what with their whole D&D operation being spearheaded by this chucklefuck.

(This is the non-archived link because I can actually embed it. Also bonus points for him essentially saying that women and non-whites are too dumb for complex rules.)

You also can't look up any of their pre-5e PDF offerings on DriveThru without being met by this:

SpoilerShow

We (Wizards) recognize that some of the legacy content available on this website does not reflect the values of the Dungeons & Dragons franchise today. Some older content may reflect ethnic, racial, and gender prejudice that were commonplace in American society at that time. These depictions were wrong then and are wrong today. This content is presented as it was originally created, because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed. Dungeons & Dragons teaches that diversity is a strength, and we strive to make our D&D products as welcoming and inclusive as possible. This part of our work will never end.

Aka "This stuff is probably problematic for modern tumblrinas, but we still want to make money off of it."

Things really started getting weird when SJWs have decreed that Drow and Orcs are problematic because they are (apparently) supposed to be black people.
I don't think they have yet retconned anything after threatening to do so, but a different "problematic" race has already been targeted:

Enter Ravenloft

So Ravenloft is essentially D&D's gothic horror setting, a grim realm ruled by assholes you can't actually get rid off because this entire realm is essentially a prison/Hell for these assholes. One of them is the vampire Strahd, who is like one of the more popular D&D villains. He's basically Not-Dracula.

Strahd basically annoys the portion of Ravenloft that's essentially Not-Romania, so naturally the setting needed Not-Gypsies, which Wizard dubbed the Vistani.
Shifty nomadic people with strange magical powers are hugely problematic, so naturally they had to change. Unfortunately, they've also overdone it a bit.
Not only are they now gentle, free-spirit vagabonds with a unique and interesting culture, but they've also erased any and all possible conflict for them. Other people now love them, and they rejoice whenever they come to visit their town/village.
Seriously? Are SJWs so sensitive they can't even handle farmers being distrustful of strangers? In a setting where any stranger could potentially be a vampire, werewolf, or something worse?
They've even re-released the 5e adaptation of the Curse of Strahd module, just so they could remove any instances of his Vistani henchmen being referred to as "evil". WTF, man?

They've also fucked over a popular Vistani villain. Now she's more of a misunderstood heroine and any references to human trafficking have been wiped out (only white bad guys are allowed to do this, I assume).
And then they've added some weird bit of virtue signaling. One of her character quirks was that she has a prosthetic leg she keeps hidden. That's not okay in Current Year, so now she parades it around loudly and proudly. This is probably to appease some weirdoes who are oddly fascinated with the idea that physical disabilities should have exactly zero impact on your dungeon-crawl shenanigans. Even if you are an axe-wielding Barbarian in a wheelchair. No, I'm not making this up.

We all know you can't ever appease SJWs, so naturally the Vistani have not been retconned enough. Even SJWs can see that all Wizards did was replace a negative Gypsie stereotype with that romanticized one Burgers always fall for.
I can guarantee you they will keep whining about Vistani until they are removed entirely. And replaced with black people I guess.

[wulfenlord]

Utsukushii :,-)

I see no longer having your lifeforce drawn out by Spoony has done wonders to your creativity also :3

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

The legacy of Counter Monkey must endure.

[Kugelfisch]

Speaking of settings being forsaken, boy is everyone glad GW came out with new and stronger Spehz Mureens. They just couldn't compete with the xenos any more. Like the Eldar, Tyrannids or even Orcs that haven't gotten new shit in fucking ages.

Seriously, the Empire of Mankind is overserved as fuck! Instead of fleshing out the Mars Roboboyz or reworking the totally not Egyptian robutts and blue space commie xenos nobody likes, they should've taken some care of the aforementioned xenos instead.
Even Chaos is underserved.

GW is in dire need of having everyone in charge getting fired.

[VoiceOfReasonPast]

The Primaris screwed over 40k, and will continue to do so. The most eyebrow-raising thing crunch-wise with them is that they have two wounds, instead of just one like regular Marines. Not even fucking Terminator armor gives you a second wound.
Come 9th edition, and GW realized people are a bit miffed that the Spess Mehreens look like underwhelming alternatives in their own Codex. So they decided to fix it.
Did they nerf the Primaris? Hell no, they gave the regular Marines a second wound as well.
The Primaris basically redefined MEQs (Marine Equivalent; anything that's about as hard to kill as a Marine), the gold standard against which every unit and weapon is measured against. I don't even want to imagine the ripple effect this has on the rules.
If your have a filthy xenos army, better hope you don't have to wait too long for an update to your guys, otherwise you will have to live with your favorite Marine killer squads no longer being able to kill the buggers fast enough.

Skitarii are cool and all, but I'm not exactly sure why Tech-Priests need their own army if they already have Titans.
I guess they wanted to give Necrons more personality, but they're not even trying to hide that they've just ported over the Tomb Kings.
And it was only natural that the animu faction would become only more animu, but I'm not sure GW really gets it:

Old Broadside BattlesuitShow

Ah, a classic in form follows function. The entire suit really only exist to act as a weapons platform on legs. Those shoulder cannons are huge enough to be put on a tank. And then they strapped friggin' missile launchers on the hands because that the fuck else are you gonna use your hands for here, anyways? Hold a sword? That's for humans.

New Broadside BattlesuitShow

I guess it looks "cooler", but you're not really taking advantage of power armor if you're just an upscaled dude with a rifle.

Also Glorious Nihon has already done this concept way better.

Stormsurge Ballistic SuitShow

Who slaps turrets on missile pods?

In other news: Magic the Gatherer player successfully copyrights his deck.