Ask Me Anything: aquafina

1. How did you discover GP & PbP?
2. New book smell or old book smell?
3. Got a site for your maps?
4. How, if at all, does music figure in your RPGing?

You've been here a while now. Do you remember your first experiences on GP, and what you thought and felt about it?

What's been your worst moment on GP (that you're comfortable talking about)?

If you could have any feature on GP, what would it be?

Standard question: Why the name?

Less standard question: What's a character archetype that you think is missing from the class selection of D&D and D&D-like games?

Standard array question:
-What's your occupation? If it's college/uni, what are you studying?

Point buy question:
- Rules-light or crunch for your RPGs?

Player to your left rolls for your stats question:
Which is the B-movie that you just have a thing for and keep rewatching?

You like a few video games that have spawned RPGs.

1) What's a RPG based on a video game that you thought poorly of?
2) What's a RPG based on a video game that doesn't exist that you wish would happen?

I had only just been introduced to TTRPGs by one of my friends here in college a couple months before joining. We had a great first session, and after it, I really wanted to learn more about D&D and whatnot. But my friend didn't have a lot of free time at the time (and even less nowadays), so we only got to play once a month-ish (now once every 2 or 3 months-ish). I didn't really know anyone else irl who played TTRPGs, so I began looking online. I found out about PbP pretty quickly actually, then signed up for a few different sites, but GP just seemed way more welcoming and I got a game within no time (thanks to @adam, who recommended I join QuantomRiot's Underling Revival (D&D5e), which is still ongoing).
Yes.

But I don't have a lot of experience with old books, my parents weren't big readers, so I've bought a lot of my own books, and have almost always picked them up new from bookstores or Amazon because the few used books I've gotten have had damage.
I like to hand-draw my maps! I don't have a lot of time to dedicate to learning new techniques or styles, so they're nothing special, but I do it for the few D&D games I've DMed and the group always gets a kick out of them. It's also just a great way for me to relax, or do while having a podcast or music on in the background and unwind before bed.

Here are some of my favorites I've made:Does anyone else here do anything similar?
I ALWAYS am the one to have background music playing through my laptop when I play in-person around a table (whether DM or player), and I am frequently jumping back and forth between 4-hour long videos and playlists on youtube depending on the atmosphere and energy of the moment. I haven't really used it in my PbP RPG playing experience so far (because I usually end up paying more attention to the music than trying to think of something to write!).

Are you actually the nerdy alter ego of Awkwafina and how was being a recent Marvel movie sidekick? :)

Those are hand-drawn?! Incredible! Impressive work!

Those are truly wonderful maps - you have real talent!

My question: do you prefer published adventures or homebrew campaigns in you D&D / Pathfinder games? Why?

Mad respect for those maps, aquafina! I also love drawing maps by hand :)

I have an ongoing worldbuilding project that I draw a map for by hand, but not for any other games. I do enjoy visually designing other stuff though like imaginary apparatuses for sci-fi games and in my live play group I got to design not one but two flags.

1. Favorite author?
2. Best single player video game? Best multi-player?
3. If you could be any rpg class in real life, which would you pick?

Favourite non-superhero comic book? I love comics as well and am always on the lookout for good recs. Feel free to name a few if you're having trouble selecting just one.

I'm going to go with my go-to with a twist:

What is some of your favorite foods, AND if every fast-food restaurant was being wiped from the face of the earth, what are three that you would save?

Favorite Dimension20 season/moment?

Not by hand. Did my first local area map with one program

Tried again later for a full continent.

With no regard to system and other people's interests, what are the top 3 kinds of stories you love to play?

I do remember my first experience here on GP, it was with you! Lol. It took me a little bit to get used to how PbP works and feels, but it was very exciting when I first joined, and I still feel the same level of excitement quite frequently on here, especially when a game is just beginning or nearing the end or just a cool moment.
There have been a few individual low moments, but I think the worst time I've had on GP was around August of last year, when the summer semester ended and the fall one began. I wholly underestimated how involved my classes would be last semester and couldn't keep up with most of my games, so I had a bit of a mass purging of my games. I think I had 2 games I was running at the time that I had to end, and then maybe another 2 or 3 that I had to leave. I think the only game I had left at that point was Underling's Revival. I was honestly surprised at how sad I was that I had to leave so many games at once :(
Why, looking to start another advent calendar? ;P

But honestly you guys have been working so hard and quickly that I haven't really had time to think of something I've wanted before it's already implemented and live! Perhaps some kind of way to PM multiple people at once or start some kind of 'thread' in the PMs, but the times I've wanted to do that, I have moved the convo to discord, so I'm not sure if it's really all that necessary.

Standard answer: I am bad at coming up with usernames and that sort of thing, so when I signed up for the site I just looked around the room, and I had just finished a bottle of aquafina water. So I thought, why not? Has a decent ring to it. I've considered changing it to aguafino or something similar to distance myself from the water company and have that spanish flair, but eh.
Somewhat less standard answer: I honestly think that pretty much anything can be made with the current classes and subclasses, you just have to do some reflavoring (my favorite thing to do lol). A witch can be a reflavored cleric/wizard multiclass, a druid, some kind of warlock, or even an artificer if you want to have that witchy trinkets and baubles feel. A psion can be a reflavored sorcerer or druid probably. Etc. Just gotta commit to the flavor.

Sounds familiar 😆

I am a current uni student studying computer science! I have an internship as a Software Validation Engineer (Quality Assurance) that I've been working sometimes full-time sometimes part-time for almost a year now, but I don't really enjoy the internship anymore (pretty boring, days are long, my only coworker isn't interested in talking much) and am looking for a new one for the fall semester of this year for sure.
I like a mix of both. I really only enjoy the crunch when it feels rewarding. I like to be able to search through my character's abilities and find a cool combo or something, but I don't like when the complicated mechanics bog down the flow of a game. D&D5e skirts the line for that pretty well for me tbh. It's certainly not the crunchiest system, but it's got just enough that if you really pay attention, you an do some cool stuff.

I feel like I might be sinking into adam's D&D5e exclusivity mindset lol. I know the system inside and out so it's just easier. I am playing in some games on here within different systems, but I feel like PbP isn't a great way to learn new systems (because I don't have a lot of time to study game mechanics all that often, and because of the irl time spent between learning rules and applying them), so it ends up being more work to remember the system than it would be playing it live, and it kinda loses something for me.
Hmm, I'm not really sure what constitutes a B-movie (am i too young?) but me and my dad's side of the family LOVE the first and second Sharknado movies (haven't seen the rest). We just can't help but suspend our disbelief and go along with all the ridiculousness and stupidity of those movies.

In terms of RPGs based on video games, I really only have experience with the Fallout and Dishonored 2d20 systems. I think the 2d20 system has some quirks to it that take some getting used to or working around, but they're good enough and fit the settings and mechanics of Fallout and Dishonored pretty well.
It could probably be achieved with an existing system, but a full-fledged system with adventure modules and stuff within the Bioshock universe would be rad as heck. I would love to fight my way through Rapture

Haha, wouldn't you like to know ;)

Thank you @Len, @Jabes.plays.RPG, and @C1INDER! :) I don't like to show my maps off too much, because I always feel like I am overestimating their coolness lol, and my parents and siblings thought it was weird when I first started drawing them in high school haha

Hm, as a PLAYER, I don't mind either way, and sometimes don't really notice except in terms of maps and whatnot. As long as the DM is having fun and enjoying the story they're telling, then I usually am. But I do love to play in official modules just so that I can relate to other people and gossip about the story and the differences in how our campaigns played out.

But as the DM, I have found that I vastly enjoy pre-written adventures more than homebrew ones. I haven't quite figured out how to write and plan good homebrew adventures yet, because too often it devolves into me telling a story and the players just reacting to it (probably overstating, but that's at least how it feels for me). It's often hard to squeeze a character's backstory into a pre-written module, but I have found that a game runs much more smoothly the less I have to improvise the main story lol

@adam, I am getting there! I have been learning the basics of CSS, HTML, JavaScript, and now PHP this semester in order to hopefully be able to contribute sometime soon! But right now, the GP code still looks like garbled bits of Middle English to me.

I have always loved Stephen King and his work, but as I've recently really gotten into reading comics books, Brian K Vaughn is very quickly catching up to dethrone the King.
Fallout 4 is my favorite video game of all time. The world, the story, the atmosphere, the settlement building, and the mod support on consoles. I love pretty much everything about it. Near perfection in my eyes.

None of my friends play video games all that much, so I've never really gotten into multi-player games. But I have spent truly countless nights staying up way too late with my brother playing Minecraft and Super Smash Bros Ultimate for the Nintendo Siwtch.
Cleric, without question. At least in D&D5e, they can be a healer, but they can also be a viable bruiser or ranged fighter depending on the subclass. Wizards are always championed as the kings of versatility, but clerics provide a good challenge. It would be great to be able to heal people as easily as you can in RPGs, while also being the Muscle, and also the Herald of Nature, and also...

(I really like clerics, okay?)

I have only really gotten into reading comic books in the last couple months, so I don't have a huge amount of reading under my belt yet, but I can list you the ones I have absolutely loved so far:

-Saga (don't really need to explain this one too much, it's a must-read as long as you're okay with very real and graphic depictions of pretty much every hot-button topic in existence)

-Starstruck (the comic book origins of the ongoing Dimension20 season. The comics are fun, crazy, full of interesting concepts and writing styles, terribly disorientating, but so so so rewarding, and well worth the number of times I furrowed my brow, looked at the previous page, then returned to the current page, still slightly confused lmao)

-Daytripper (a very deep graphic novel that I finished last month, but still think about every other day, and will probably continue to ponder and reread for a while)

-Critical Role: Mighty Nein Origins (most of Critical Role's comics are just okay and nothing too special, but these ones have been consistently amazing. I would recommend not reading these without already having watched Campaign 2 of Critical Role, as they contain literally the MOST MASSIVE SPOILERS POSSIBLE, but they are well worth the wait. The art and page layouts are some of the most beautiful I've seen so far in comic books, and do a great job of setting the characters up for C2)

What I'm currently reading:
-Low by Image Comics (currently making my way through the trade paperback of volume 1, and while the writing is sometimes way too in-your-face obvious, the art is gorgeous, the worldbuilding is interesting, and the story is gripping)

Please, send me your non-superhero comic book/graphic novels recommendations if anyone has any! Next on my list are (in no particular order) Paper Girls, Through the Woods, Something Is Killing The Children, and the official D&D comic books.

What the most disappointing place you've traveled to? Can be as small as a landmark or as large as a city
Favorite green lantern?
Favorite jellybean flavor?
'Trademark Question' ©Antiproduct: What do movies and television get wrong about your culture?

Oh boy, those are some good questions!

My parents may have raised me and my siblings to be adventurous and anti-picky-eaters, but good ol pizza will forever be my go-to. My favorite toppings are Pepperoni, Mushroom, and Sausage. When I was living at home, me and my family would always make a point to visit all the popular pizza places in the area at least once a year, just cause. And I have, many times over the past couple years of university life, eaten pizza for many meals in a row and been completely happy with that.

But besides that, I'm also a sucker for some good sushi, have a terrible sweet tooth for chocolate and cookies, and can never turn down a good fry, whether french, sweet potato, curly, or waffle (I often order a side of fries, even if I get something that does not match it at all).
Well, the first one's easy. I worked as a Sandwich Artist at Subway for a couple years in high school, and I had such a great time working there. I knew half of the staff that worked there from middle school and was still great friends with them (small town things), so it was always cool to hang out at work. And I just love the subs there too, which helps.

Chipotle and Qdoba would be my other two saves. Chipotle for their bowls and burritos, and Qdoba for their quesadillas.

What is a favorite family tradition that might or might not be holiday based?

Hm, I haven't traveled a TON, and have almost always had a great time wherever I've gone, but I think the closest I've ever been to being disappointed, was my family's trip to Chicago a few years back. The Windy City really lived up to its name, because it was so miserably rainy and windy for most of our trip that it really put a damper on some of the things we had planned.
Might be a controversial take, but I guess Jonah Hill's from The Lego Movie (?). I have given up on most DC movie properties. I have seen a lot, but the only DC movies I can remember actually enjoying are the first Wonder Woman, Birds of Prey, and the 2021 Suicide Squad remake. I think Ryan Reynolds is good in anything, but I just didn't like any of the movies he's in.
Most of my experience eating jelly beans comes from those Bean Boozles jelly bean packs. So anything that isn't Old Bandage, Rotten Egg, or Barf is good in my book lol.
Hm, I think most media represents redneck backwater small Ohio towns pretty well to be honest. People are friendly but intimidating, can either be the nicest people you've ever met or the most racist and homophobic people ever (and you often can't tell til they open their mouth, or you see the signs (or lack thereof) posted in their front lawn), everyone's up in everyone else's business (for the good and the bad), high school sports are taken very seriously by a majority of the population, gossip spreads like wildfire in a wheat field, the weather makes no sense, Walmart and Meijer were indeed favorite hangout spots for us during middle and high school, and everyone who lives here loves to hate Ohio but get EXTREMELY DEFENSIVE when people call us Michigan, Indiana, or Iowa, which happens way more than you'd think for some reason.

The only thing is, and it's very minor, but NO ONES GOES AROUND TIPPING COWS FOR FUN. NO ONE.

Seems like it would be pointless anyway. What would they spend their tips on?

Cow tipping? What utter nonsense!

Fun fact: The Windy City doesn't refer to actual wind, but an insult to Chigaoans who were viewed as "full of hot air" and "windbags" lol. I learned this like a year ago and it is so amusing I have to share it whenever the topic comes up.

Since Bowl hasn't done it yet...

Did you mean "Udder" nonsense? 🤣

Not for fun? So is it for money or religious reasons?

Exactly!

Rite of passage? Hazing? Establishing dominance?

For the XP?

For Fun? NO! We shall do it... for EVIL!

Oh man, that is an impossible question. I think my top three favorite seasons are Crown of Candy, the Seven, and the ongoing Starstruck Odyssey campaign. I think you can tell from that list how much I love absurdism. Crown of Candy had that Game of Thrones feel that Games of Thrones itself lost, and having Game of Thrones set in Candyland is the PERFECT thing in existence. The Seven and Starstruck have just so many truly batcrap crazy hilarious moments that I have had to pause and stop watching it on my lunchbreak at work because I was crying trying to hold in my laughter.

My favorite moments are both the absolutely stupidly absurdly funny moments and then the moments that made me cry. So my favorite funny moments are: Sexy Rat, Hilda Hilda, the moment in the bar with the proldier on Rec 97, Hairy Baby (see a common thread of Emily Axford in those? lol), and pretty much any moment with Arthur Aguefort, Chungle-Down Bim, Plug, Laertes, or Evan Kelmp.

As for the sad bits (may contain spoilers, but I'm keeping it vague): almost the entirety of Crown of Candy, but especially Episode 9, Riz's moment with his dad, eveything that happens in the Nightmare Forest, and Sofia finding out the truth about what happened to Dale.

I dont feel like we have a lot of special traditions outside of holidays really, besides maybe just Monday and Sunday night dinners at my dad's house lol. We always ate together at the dining room table whenever we could, but with three kids and two parents, it always seemed like there was somebody at soccer practice, band rehearsal, hanging with friends, or working. But we were never allowed to make plans (with friends or work or anything) on Monday and Sunday nights. My parents were divorced and we went back and forth between houses every week, so Monday was always the first time we got to see each other at my dad's after a week, and Sunday was the last. It was annoying sometimes of course but was a good thing in the long run.