Dungeons and Discourse implementation

(Gah, denial of service attack detected! Roll for willpower or lose two hours of your life! ... Failed, dammit.)

Very nice. I remember an older attempt at a D&Dis system soon after the comic came out, but yours is much more unified and internally consistent. And all classes have lots of nice spells and the pun level is adequate. Looks fun.

Before reading, I thought, "Hey, let's try to roll a Discordian!", but then I wondered what I have to choose to cast "dispel colonialism". I guess I'll have to enter the dreaded halls of the continentals.

(This is a bit of a pet peeve. Don't take this as serious criticism. It's not even representative of the whole work, but if I go continental, I might as well quote-mine, summon the subtext and cast Wall of Text to further my own agenda.)

Logic is the purest of the disciplines, and does not permit alternate opinions; all students of logic learn the same spells regardless of their beliefs.

Dialetheists would like to have a word with you. (And its not just an obscure position. Many Mahayana philosophers have fully embraced it for centuries.)

Asians may follow non-dualist philosophies like Buddhism or Taoism that eschew the material world.

First of, Asian? The bloody European traditions get 3 out of 5 races, but Asian philosophy gets one?! The Confucians, Vedantists, Jains and whatnot really appreciate being lumped with the depressing Buddhists and crazy Taoists. Ancient Indian philosophy alone already had all the other classes (well, maybe not Objectivism). If you mean non-dual, just say that.

(And Hades, throwing the Greeks together also just... makes my eyes twitch. I'm really not a fan of lumping philosophies by whatever geography made it most prominent (in the West). "Anglo-American" and "Continental" is fine, as both have a fairly unified attitude and there are no better labels. But Greeks and Asians are way too diverse, especially when you identify them with one example that has nothing in common with other, equally important traditions. "Aristotelean" and "Non-dual" or something like that would be better.)

And Taoism is not really non-dual. I can see why you would mention it, as some branches are (particular the visible western ones), but it has the frigging yin-yang as its symbol for a reason. Also, Taoists have spent most of history trying to become physically immortal and to have as much fun in the process as possible. They are outright (physical) hedonists. There is nothing about renunciation in Taoism at all.

Greeks are the original philosophers.

As someone learning Akkadian, I'll put on my philosophy hipster hat and would like to remind you that, as a rule of thumb, everything is Older Than You Think. "Archetypal" philosophers, alright. They really made the profession cool. But "original"?

(Loving the Elves, though.)

If Theist: Catholicism | Protestantism | Syncretism |Fideism | Evidentialism | Serve God | Serve Mammon

I understand that this list is not meant to be complete at all, but theism = Christianity? At least a token polytheist or something? I'm way too underground for this Jesus stuff, I totally want a Heavenly Court or some dragons. You cannot be good without dragons.

In D&Dis, Absolutists get -2 morality, and Anarchists get -1 phronesis.

It's nice to see that in Sophia, the Anarchist scare is over.

DERRIDA'S DECONSTRUCTION HEX (4B)
Cast during an argument between a player and the GM over a rule interpretation. You analyze the rulebook for hidden meanings that may be opposite to the apparent intent of the text, ensuring victory to your favored interpretation of the rules. GM can nullify this spell at his discretion if abused. Starting an argument over otherwise clear rules just so you can use this spell is definitely an abuse.

So you favor a totalitarian GM, a gatekeeper of the Truth? Any criticism can be dispelled as attacking a "clear" rule (ignoring that the existence of the attack and the viability of an alternative interpretation question this "clarity")? What, exactly, did this GM do to gain privileged access to Truth? And what constitutes "abuse" depends on the abuser and the abused and their socio-cultural frameworks. Simply silencing an interpretation as "abuse" is an exertion of power, not an argument. Any power must be questioned. You are clearly including this exception so you can protect your pet weltanschauung and existing power structure. Your subtext speaks louder than your text. Also before, Nietzscheans are the only ones to summon dragons, without which you can't be good, so you give away your immorality. That you give Absolutists a -2 morality is clearly just signaling. You imperialist. (Am I doing this continental thing right? Do I need more being?)

BANISH P-ZOMBIE (R)

But... how do I know who I can cast this on?

Looking through your item list, I'm kinda divided. On the one hand, it makes sense, is funny and represents all the branches I wish would constitute philosophy. On the other hand, I see only a single continental book. There really should be a Heidegger or Hegel. How else am I to cast confusion, negate any spells into their synthesis or get into a greater state of dasein?

Materials are not priced like other items: the exact price of an object depends on the size of the object, the quality of the material, and the purpose to which it is being used. The price mentioned here is only a guide for the DM to determine context-appropriate prices for these objects - if you can find them at all!

You mean the price depends on the amount of labor that went into their production, right?

I am reminded, for reasons that will be obvious to anyone who's read (all of) Yvain's handbook, of an email signature I see every now and then on a mailing list I frequent. "It is very dark, and after the year 2000. If you proceed you are likely to be eaten by a bleen."

I don't know how much sense the real-world tropes of skeptical atheists and fervently faithful theists make in a world where you can literally bargain with God to get your dead friend back from Heaven. In the D&Dis world, it really is atheism that requires faith!

I'm confused. The manual gives the Nitzschean forms lion, dragon and child. I thought they were camel, lion and child - and the lion kills the dragon.

Looks awesome. Some errata:

• bottom of page 7 says Cartesian doubt is 3 speed and 1 rationality, while the list on page 13 says it's 3 speed and 0 rationality.
• second paragraph on page 7 says "cast two squares and then cast the spell".
• page 59 lists LHP things for RHP, where it says "giving you"
• page 89 says "PROBABILITY THEORY: THE LANGUAGE OF SCIENCE" whereas it's actually the logic of of science.

Hey, finally! I would be interested in participating.

I love playing devil's advocate, so I'll be anything - in fact, if there is a class called Devil's Advocate, I'll play that.

It's been done.

Video chat seems like it would make this more fun. Tinychat works alright for group video chat.

So, when does this start?

Error page 59: the list of points for each level in the Right-Hand Path is that of the Left-Hand Path.

Color me interested.

I think the character creation rules really should be collected together. Has is, I can't figure out how your supposed to determine many of your initial statistics (wealth level, hit points, speed...). Also I don't like the fact that the number of points you have to distribute among the big five and among the skills are random. And of course a system where you simply divide X points among your stats however you wish is completely broken. You should really think about introducing some limit on the number of point you can put into one your stat and some sort of diminishing return.

But even if many part of the design are open to criticism what you've created is still very awesome.

ETA: There are a lot of references in the rules to a Faith stat, except that there is no such stat! Also, the righteousness stat is often called morality in the rules.

Can the automatic expiration of Enantiomerize kill a creature? For instance, if a creature is in front of me, and I enantiomerize it to behind me, and then I take a step forward, causing in front of me to mean off a cliff...

Plusses:

• The spells/class abilities
• The Levels of Control mechanic
• Optimal philantrophy plugs in the form of charity donations
• The monsters
• The way classes are implemented
• "Elves cannot be left out of a role-playing game under any circumstances"
• The spells/class abilities

As further plusses, lots of creative and thematic mechanics:

• Taxation/tithing
• Magic arrows
• The rituals of g'nash
• Laws
• The spells/class abilities

Minuses:

• Spell slots? In a game written in 2011? Come on!

On Dialectic: Having debates as an explcit part of the game is nice. Just having them amount to "argue until one of you gives up, with the DM deciding who wins if you can't agree" I'm not so sure about. On the other hand, it means that you'll be spending plenty of time debating things, which is nice. On the other hand, it's going to be hard to constantly come up with new angles into the debates - especially if the players don't have PhDs in philosophy.

Borrowing something like Burning Wheel's Duel of Wits mechanic or some other social combat system might work. (Though in BW, debates are explicitly about persuading an audience, not about finding the truth.) I particularly like BW's approach in that each time somebody takes damage, they have to make some concession to the opponent. That's more interesting than just declaring one participant the winner and another the loser.

Perhaps I am missing the joke, but the Seed AI seems to be missing from the Summons section.

Oh, you're beautiful! Why is this not a top level post!?

EDIT: Strength. Once again . . . the dump stat.

I've got several emails, but for the purposes of this I'll use carinthium@gmail.com.

Karl, Manfred, muflax, zefreak, Carinthium, Emile - and anyone else who's interested in participating but hasn't said so yet - please send me your email, either by posting it here, by PMing it to me, or by sending it to scott[at]shireroth[dot]org.

I haven't read through the whole thing yet, but I was wondering if, to guide my reading a bit, you'd care to comment on your design philosophy? Is it "old-school" or "narrativist" or "step on up" or something? Do you have a take on Forge-style design?

FYI, I showed the manual to a (non-Less Wrong) philosophy-major friend who runs D&D games, so you may develop a splinter group.

Oh well, I've wasted enough time on this that I might as well participate. I'm interested in a campaign too (playing as a Buddhist or Continental), as long as it stays text-based. No promises, though.

Question- where does it saw how many attribute points a starting character has? I can't seem to find it.

I'm very interested in playing

This looks amazing - congratulations! Would love to play, either online if the timings work out, or in London/Oxford if enough other people are interested.

I'm not sure if I'll be able to make it time-wise, but I would like to participate if I can.

I'd be interested in participating! I'll have a look at the manual ...

Cool! Do Problem Sleuth or Homestuck next :-)

... isn't this a bit of topic for LW?