OOC discussion

[Surreal]

Put myself through school and came out with enough to buy a 4 bedroom house. Not too bad for a pennypinching miser   Also, the Canadian economy isn't as volatile as the US.

[Brainpiercing]

It's not about a volatile economy, it's about making and/or saving money throughout college. I'm in Germany, and I can't say I've saved up anything much throughout my university years - and we have basically free tuition.

What college did you go to? My girlfriend just spent two semesters at the UofT. She liked it, but it's really a lot different compared to Germany. AND she complained about the cost of housing, in particular, since you could easily pay well over 500$ for a few square meters of cellar hole.

[Surreal]

I live pretty cheaply most of the time. I go on road trips with friends instead of big vacations, catch free music show in small venues instead of big concerts, get student discounts on everything, etc. I'm also a pretty smart guy and make a reasonable wage through scholarships and research grants (so I essentially get paid to go to school).

I go to the University of Manitoba, which has one of the lowest tuition costs in the country. Housing here is also very cheap; maybe half or a third of the expensive places like Toronto or Vancouver. While our pay scale is very low compared to the rest of the country, our overall cost of living is proportionally lower as well, so it all evens out.

[Snizor]

Put myself through school and came out with enough to buy a 4 bedroom house. Not too bad for a pennypinching miser  

Show-off 

BP:
Finals are this coming week so I'll not be able to post until they are over. Once those are out of the way, I'll have a lot more free time available.

[Omen of Peace]

What kind of job did you have, Surreal ?

Some of my friends in the US do have a pretty terrible debt because of tuition fees... In Europe we have it easy.

[Surreal]

I worked mostly through research. Scholarships and research grants have paid my way through school, and frugal living and investing allowed me to save up. Granted, I also lived with my folks for a very long time, which is a bit atypical by North American standards, but very common in the Asian community. Shared resources and no need for rent drastically reduce one's cost of living (granted, I still put money into the house, helped pay for my bro's college tuition, bought a family car, etc). If I had set out on my own when I hit 18, I probably wouldn't have any money to my name right now.

[Brainpiercing]

It's good when you can do that kind of thing. I can say that while we're not payed well, I do get enough to at least not sit on a debt once I finish my PhD. Still, even from a planning perspective I would not want to buy a house now. The way jobs are distributed at the moment it's pretty unlikely that I'll be getting a job anywhere close by, so it'll just be a gamble to invest now.

[Surreal]

One of my main incentives to buy a house right now was the low mortgage rates. I got a fixed rate at 3.75% for the next 5 years, which is pretty good. I know one person playing the variable rates right now and her mortgage is a crazy low 1.6%

Now that I've fixed up my rooms and put some basic furnishings in, I've advertised for roommates and will use the rental money to help pay off my mortgage. As long as we don't have another market or housing crash (knock on wood), I should be making money on my house.

[Brainpiercing]

One of my main incentives to buy a house right now was the low mortgage rates. I got a fixed rate at 3.75% for the next 5 years, which is pretty good. I know one person playing the variable rates right now and her mortgage is a crazy low 1.6%

Now that I've fixed up my rooms and put some basic furnishings in, I've advertised for roommates and will use the rental money to help pay off my mortgage. As long as we don't have another market or housing crash (knock on wood), I should be making money on my house.

That sounds like a good plan. Wouldn't easily work in Germany, though , houses are REALLY expensive here.

[Omen of Peace]

Ah, frugal living. Not for me, then.

I never tried, but I've always lived in expensive areas anyway (the Bay Area, now Paris). Just the price of housing is crazy in those 2 places.

[Brainpiercing]

I've still been completing my house-rules taking care NOT to change things that are already being used without consulting you guys - I hope I haven't made mistakes there.
Some questions:

I've recently seen some other game grant something like triple HD at first level (only HP, no Con), or bonus hitpoints. I think that's actually a good idea. Now I'm still undecided as to what's better:
A triple HD would really favour the big HD classes at first level, or those pesky dragons. Handing out a flat 10-15 bonus HP would even out the playing field and make Lvl 1 wizards (other than conjurors, who don't need it, duh) a bit more playable. Then again... it has been my policy to be a little less nice to the casters than to the melee guys, AND we've lost our only gish, anyway...

Hmm.
Maybe Full HP +2x the rounded average? So a Wizard gets 4+6, while a Barb gets 12+14. Takes a bit of heat off the grunts, you really don't want to be lvl 1 in melee in this world. Then again, you would be a kid, anyway. Even so, that almost gives the Wizard enough HP to survive one attack .

Now that isn't to suggest someone should play low level, I'm just going for world consistency here. I want to decrease the 16-year-old mortality rate a little .

The other question is that I've always been advocating the rule of "Thou shalt not suck", and that means that some abilities must be revised, such as:

Non-scaling class abilities (ugh), and 1/day class abilities that are never advanced, or maybe from classes that you would only ever dip anyway.
Feats that give a 1/day ability. That sucks, I hate 1/day abilities.

I've already granted Smudgy 1+CON-modifier Rages/day, even though Barbs DO advance Rage well enough.
Well, if you have some suggestions, in this respect, please come forward.

[Smudgy]

I can't say no to more HP, so that's fine by me. Does this just affect the PCs, or everyone in the world, enemies included?

As for the 1/day thing, perhaps a table like the Feral template? The fast healing and damage reduction scale with Hit Dice.  So considering how LA isn't present anymore, I think that might work out alright, what with it being replaced by HD.

Or they could just be based off of certain ability scores for simplicity.  But that might make some abilities too powerful, considering how easy it is to beef up stats.  I mean, you could put a cap on it, but some abilities that were really only meant to be once or twice a day could become too powerful compared to what's required to attain them.

[Brainpiercing]

Well, the HP would probably apply to everything, seeing as this is a buff for mainly low level people, and depending on how many bonus HP people get it'll be far less important at higher level. As it is, I'd like to keep it so that PCs will generally out-damage NPCs, which means that usually it'll be more to your advantage than to the other guys'.

[Smudgy]

Just an update on how ive been.  After graduation on Sunday I've beenn out partying and whatnot, and have a girlfriend now.  So ,that's the.,. good side of the news.  The bad news is that I'm terribly sick right now (a hackin, wheezing cough, 101 degree fever, overall terbbleness).  I'm in no mood to post anything from Agnak's perspective right now, much less type up this post.  But I'll be out for the next day or two (hopefully that's all) until I leave friday for camping (if I'm better by then0.

Overall, sorry for beening so negligent of this game.

Oh yeah, and happy soon-to-be one year anneverrsary of this game!

[Brainpiercing]

Holy shit, it's really been that long already??

[Brainpiercing]

As an aside, congrats to YOU guys for sticking with me so long.

And thank you!

[Omen of Peace]

- HPs: you could also simply double the HP at first level (including doubling the Con modifier).

- 1/day abilities: I'm all in favour of allowing more of these. In some cases they can simply turned into encounter abilities.

[Brainpiercing]

- HPs: you could also simply double the HP at first level (including doubling the Con modifier).

Hmm...
That would give the average Wizard max around +7, I guess. Well, that MAY allow him to at least survive one hit at Lvl 1. On the other hand, adding the CON modifier should really only be done if you give a complete fake HD without anything but HP, or else you'll have a huge mess with adding ability boost via RHD. At which level does a character get that possible +6Con HD, if he has three or four RHD below his class levels?
My favourite is still just adding a flat 10-15HP to eveyone.

- 1/day abilities: I'm all in favour of allowing more of these. In some cases they can simply turned into encounter abilities.

Yes, although that may totally shift some feats from useless to great. Ok, that's what I'm trying to do, dammit. Sudden MM for the win. I would totally buy it for 1/encounter.

P.S.: OoP: You're like WAY overdue with a post .

[dither]

- 1/day abilities: I'm all in favour of allowing more of these. In some cases they can simply turned into encounter abilities.

Yes, although that may totally shift some feats from useless to great. Ok, that's what I'm trying to do, dammit. Sudden MM for the win. I would totally buy it for 1/encounter.

"I'd buy that for a dollar!"

[Brainpiercing]

Oh by the way, welcome Dither, he very possibly will  be joining us, soon!