In other news, I lost another D&D character last night. If you ever play in a Decent into Avernus campaign (and hey, we actually have an open spot right now), don't get overly attached to your characters.

Ahh, sorry to hear that, Aaarrrgh!

Our campaign was just cancelled because we had missed too many sessions for various reasons, and we'll be losing two or three players in August, so while my character didn't die, his story did sort of peter out.

It's not too bad, honestly. I am plagued with an abundance of character concepts, so now I get to do something else. And this time, I'm not the healer! So I'm kinda excited.

Hey if my character didn’t die then we didn’t adventure hard enough.

I am interested.

I sent your a PM with details.

Want to drop a link to some old school RPG bloggery some of you might enjoy. And what's this? They're discussing the color pie?
https://monstermanualsewnfrompants.blog ... ystem.html

I wish I had something to share, but honestly I've been too busy this week to do much of anything. I "broke my record" this week of most patients I had to cover by myself (99 btw, with 70-some-odd of them in the morning half) so I've not been in a great mood.

I have been tinking away at my newest/latest worldbuilding project, though, which mostly means I've been doing research on mythology and various animals' biology, but I'm thinking of taking some older ideas I've posted about before and using them for this world.

Well, as sad as it is to say, the family is considering getting a new kitten. It's been long enough that we need to move on, even without closure.

But on the plus side, new kitten!

You never quite know with cats, though. My parents' cat once was missing for something like three months before he was found flirting with the she-cat at a farm two miles away from their place. So there is at least a possibility that your old cat is just out there somewhere living its best life.

How was everyone's week this week?

In actual writing news, I think I've got an itch to pick up on Antony again.

I have a somewhat similar story with a dog my family had years ago. Since we lived on a big plot out in the country, we never really tied up our dogs, and just taught them that the property is their territory (i.e. punish them when they go wandering off, etc.). Well, one day our dog noticed a couple jogging and just decided to follow them along. He followed them all the way home I-don't-remember-how-many-miles-away and they brought him back the next day. He would have been perfectly happy living with them, methinks.

Similarly, we had at least one dog run away and join the circus.


Bluuuuuuuugh

Work has been unbelievably busy the last few weeks and we've had some people quit lately leaving even more short-staffed than we already were. We really need at least 4 new hires ASAP and I believe we're rapidly reaching a tipping point for failure again.

Meanwhile I've been doing research into wolves, bison, and Greco-Roman society for worldbuilding during work so that I'm not melting my brain on social media, and mostly unwinding with video games at home. Sometimes I'll write personal things for myself until I'm too tired to stay awake and think I accidentally hit on an aromantic/asexual plot?

Also a steelbook for Interspecies Reviewers is available for pre-order now and I'm considering actually getting it. Normally I'm against pre-ordering anything but, like, not only was this something I already enjoyed (as opposed to something I've never seen/played being hyped up), but it comes with some sort of artbook, too.

I'm on board for picking something like that up myself, though more in a reverse boycott kind of way. The fact Funimation dropped it for not living up to their "standards" is it garbage considering other series they've put out.

I now have a new kitten and after much deliberation have decided to name her Mirri.

I was going to suggest Jade.

Wasitora.
Other MTG cat name.
That's all I got.

Yay, kitten!

Yep, that's about all I've got Wish everybody good things and all

PS: Anybody got suggestions for turn-based rpgs (or interesting RP games) that don't require silly amounts of grinding?

Context: my some of my steam faves are the Shadowrun trilogy, Slay the Spire, Banner Saga and the XCOM series (minus the real-time resource management)

(Red Strings Club is a cool example of the RP kind)

I haven't played much of it yet, but I've enjoyed what I've seen of Wildermyth so far. A friend of mine suggested it, and he's played a lot more than I have and really likes it.

So, Slay the Spire, Banner Saga, and XCOM are all games with which I am familiar

Neoverse is a lot like Slay the Spire in that it's this "roguelike" (I hate how watered-down that term has become) deckbuilding game where you go through a few acts of stuff, engaging monsters in turn-based combat. I actually think, from a mechanical perspective, it might be better than Slay the Spire, with a smoother system and more freedom of choice. It's also clearly easier (60 hours playtime for me to 100% it) but that's not necessarily a bad thing with how much Slay the Spire can get into "have the broken combo or die" land

Battletech seems to be in the right band of Banner Saga and XCOM. Turn based, mission-based combat. It's got both story mode and more of a "free play" mode, but in either case you're flying through space with your company of mercenaries in mechas, taking on contracts for fortune and glory. The combat is nice and strategic too, with both concerns over how you build your mechs (balancing available weapon mountings with available tonnage with the need to dissipate heat with the desire to do more damage) and good play with terrain, elevation, facing, evasion, maneuvering, the works.

Cultist Simulator isn't EXACTLY turn-based. It's more timer and idle based. However, you can pause arbitrarily and often want to, so it's not the kind of game that requires reflexes: you either let things tick, or stop them and decide what to put where. I can't really say much more. It's a brilliant game, but figuring out how to play the game is part of the joy of the game, as is exploring the richly detailed setting.

Monster Train is another deckbuilder. It's a little different from Slay the Spire or Neoverse, but it's still fun, and has the same satisfaction of creating combos in design and playing them out in turn-based competition with the threats thrown your way.

Then there are two that I've investigated but haven't bought into yet, mostly just because I haven't played out the games I own just yet: Quantum Protocol and Library of Ruina. They've both got very good reviews.

Thank you! I'll check on those titles soon.

Cultist Simulator I already own, and while its strategy and exploration are a lot of fun, the real time clock, even if stoppable whenever, lures me into constantly going for the next cycle and basically forcing a Willpower check if I ever want to close it, which is annoying