so the best thing about this is that bobcats, like just about every feline besides lions and domestic cats, are pretty solitary. they don’t really have friends. they aren’t really equipped to make friends.
domestic cats, on the other hand, do know how to make friends. they are friendly to the point that lots of feral cats live in colonies— the females hang out together, even raise kids together, and the males like to spend nonsexual time with their baby mommas. they groom each other, play around, and have a particular tail position to signal to one another— straight up with the tip curled— that they’re friendly and happy to see each other. cats learned how to be chill with each other in order to take full advantage of human food sources: an ancient granary supplies enough rats for a lot of cats, as does a modern lady with a big bag of frisky bits, so it would be a waste of time and energy for any one cat to try and stake the entire foodsource out for exclusive use. less fighting means more eating and resting which means a longer, nicer life and a lot more kittens.
so this stray cat, she obviously has no colony if she’s wandering around and sneaking into zoo enclosures, so she’s like ‘hey! there’s food here! what up, other cat, let’s be friends, let’s be friends and share that food’. and the bobcat is like ‘??????’ because actually wild cats are pretty cautious about initiating hostilities and anything new and aggressive makes them very worried. and the domestic cat is like ‘haha cool, ok, we’re friends now, big guy. no problems.’ and the bobcat is like ‘????? well…?? ok?’ and then they are friends.
the super interesting thing about most wild cat species is they don’t really have the capacity to make friends on their own, especially outside of sibling bonds, but, if someone comes along and does all the friend-making themselves, they’ll totally roll with it. zoo cats can get really attached to their caregivers— or, in this case, a very confident little calico demonstrating exactly why her species has been so darn successful over the last nine thousand years .
so anyway that is the best thing: bobcats are not equipped to make friends, but luckily for this bobcat this homeless lady did not give any shits and made friends anyway. and now they are both happy.
THOU is the subject (Thou art…) THEE is the object (I look at thee) THY is for words beginning in a consonant (Thy dog) THINE is for words beginning in a vowel (Thine eyes)
this has been a psa
Also, because H was sometimes treated as a vowel when the grammar rules for thou/thee/thy/thine were formed,THINE can also be used for words beginning with H. For example, both “thy heart” and “thine heart” appear in Elizabethan poetry.
For consistency, however, if you’re saying “thine eyes”, make sure you also say “mine eyes” instead of “my eyes”.
Further to the PSA:
Thou/thee/thine is SINGULAR ONLY.
Verbs with “thou” end in -st or -est: thou canst, thou hast, thou dost, thou goest. Exception: the verbs will, shall, are, and were, which add only -t: thou wilt, thou shalt, thou art, thou wert.
Only in the indicative, though – when saying how things are (“Thou hast a big nose”). Not in the subjunctive, saying how things might be (“If thou go there…”) nor in the imperative, making instructions or requests (“Go thou there”).
The -eth or -th ending on verbs is EXACTLY EQUIVALENT TO THE -(e)s ENDING IN MODERN ENGLISH.
I go, thou goest, she goeth, we go, ye go, they go.
If you wouldn’t say “goes” in modern English, don’t say “goeth” in Shakespearean English.
“Goeth and getteth me a coffee” NO. KILL IT WITH FIRE.
Usually with an imperative you put the pronoun immediately after the verb, at least once in the sentence (“Go thou” / “Go ye”).
YE is the subject (Ye are…). YOU is the object.
Ye/you/your is both for PLURALS and for DEFERENCE, as vous in French.
There’s more, but that’ll do for now.
Oh wow. Reblogging for reference.
English has never made sense
on a similar note: the archaic idiom “must needs” is not equivalent to the verb “need,” and is more like “absolutely have to;” as such, in order to make sense it must be followed by a verb phrase rather a noun. “we must needs be patient” is correct, “we must needs patience” is not. the auxiliary verb “must” is active in that phrase, “needs” is essentially duplication to intensify, kind of like english double negatives: “i don’t want anything to do with them” is less emphatic a statement than “i don’t want nothing to do with them.”
Lots of DMs struggle with this, and for good reason.
Dungeons are the most mechanically straightforward aspect of the game besides combat, and the immediate shape and contents of them is more pressing to players than the atmosphere.
But, there are some simple ways to make your dungeons more atmospheric. Here’s my proposed solutions, both a long thinky one and a fast random one:
I think that dungeons should thought about as ‘once functional spaces’. Every place in the world has a purpose for which it was built, even if it’s a weirdo crazy one. Dungeon rooms should almost always be more than just treasure, traps, and monsters.
For example, temples have cloisters, treasuries, storage rooms, waiting rooms, choirs, sanctuaries, apse, washing rooms, etc. Each of these rooms has specific objects and furniture inside them, as well as different acoustics. They get decorated with frescoes and murals or hanging art or sculptures. They’re cultural places. Think about them as physical spaces that people would use.
Now imagine something happened in them, long ago. Why is this place a ‘dungeon’ and not still used? What event caused it to be abandoned? A battle? Plague? Was the place cursed? Come up with that and you can seed the rooms with small historical details: evidence of fights, skeletal remains, treasures hidden so they could be reclaimed later (but never were).
Now add the effects of time and nature. Fabric rots, metal rusts, stone erodes and crumbles. Plants and roots push stone tiles aside, and water seeps in and floods deep places. The passage of ages scours away history and purpose. Now, your once functional rooms don’t appear so functional, but their purpose can still be intuited.
Now add some new tenants. Monsters are always the first to reclaim abandoned civilized spaces: goblins make shantytowns out of old human ruins, beasts make warrens in sepulchral tombs, small dragons and basilisks favour places with statuaries and abandoned treasures. No matter the space or its original purpose, monsters move in and call it home. Sometimes multiple species of monsters…and then they fight or argue over sharing space.
So now your dungeon has a vivid look and feel. The important bit now is to think about how that imagined space sounds and smells.
With every room and hallway, imagine how its history smells. Is it acrid or pungent? Smokey or mouldy? Does it smell surprisingly pleasant? If so, that’s often a worrisome sign, because it means something sentient might already be there.
Audio can clue players into a space faster than any other description. Wind whistling indicates access to the surface…or a much deeper cave. Dripping denotes water (you hope). Creaking could mean doors…or ghosts. Large spaces echo, and sounds warp and distort the further away they are. There’s even different kinds of silence. There’s an empty, lonely silence that comes with long dead spaces, or the claustrophobic close silence of small spaces.
Appeal to your players senses besides sight. Describe what rooms smell, sound, and even taste or feel like. This is a surefire way to make your dungeon rooms stand out. For example:
“You enter a 20 by 20 foot square room. It’s a stuffy old parlour. Pushing the door open you immediately smell something caustic and sour, but you don’t see an immediate source. All the furniture is rotted, but some of it looks smashed. You can hear the faintest scraping of something against the wall in the adjacent room”.
If that seems like a lot to write, try something like this: Reveal each bullet point as the players inquire about them, or when they make Perception checks:
Parlour, 20 ft square room.
The room feels uncomfortably thick and stuffy.
All the furniture is rotted out. Some of it is smashed. Evidence of a fight.
Smells caustic and sour. The smell comes from under a tattered rug. It’s beholder puke. 50gp if collected and sold to the right buyer.
Scraping sounds from the cloaker in the next room.
So maybe you already have a pretty basic dungeon and you need to make each room (or block of rooms) less boring. Here’s my handy set of sense tables:
Random Room Sensations:
For each room you want to enhance, roll four dice (a d12, a d10, a d8, and a d6). Your rolls will determine what’s up with this room. Every time you roll a result, cross it out and replace it with a new one you come up with.
Smells (1d12):
Sickly sweet, like rotting fruit or wilting flowers.
Musty, like old people and expired cologne.
Tangy, like body odour and grime.
Dusty, the choking scent of age and ghosts.
Foul, like waste and death; something unholy.
Crisp, like freshly cut grass or unchecked plant life.
Soggy, the lingering smell of still water and flooding.
Pungent, like rot and decay.
Spicy, like herbs and dried ingredients, aged.
Electric, a faint aroma of ozone and metals.
Earthy, like fresh dirt and clay, mixed in with the copper of blood.
Roll again twice, both smells clash together.
Sounds (1d10):
Claustrophobic silence.
Deep, echoing silence.
Low moaning or groaning.
Creaking of wood in the distance.
Faint, maddeningly indistinct whispering.
Faint, maddeningly indistinct whispering in a language you don’t know.
Metal scraping against metal, rhythmically.
Dripping of some kind of liquid onto stone.
Dripping of some kind of liquid into more liquid.
Roll again twice, both sounds are present.
Touch Sensations (1d8):
Dryness on the skin, chapped lips and dry eyes.
Cold dampness, water beads on metal items.
Humidity, clothes become hot and heavy, metal feels colder.
Dry heat, throats become parched, skin itches.
Pressure change, ears pop and noises distort.
Static tingling, hair stands up on end, goosebumps.
Unholy chill, shivers, goosebumps, a sense of unease.
The feeling of being watched, an uncomfortable presence.
Kinds of Darkness, if applicable (1d6):
Grey, distant darkness that yields to lantern light.
Cloying, smothering darkness that seems to draw close to you.
Eerie still darkness that feels like it holds endless monsters.
Calm, still darkness that invites restfulness.
Flickering, shifting darkness where the room seems to be moving.
Impenetrable darkness that makes darkvision endowed races feel at uneasy.
I hope all this helps make your dungeons a little less boring. The dungeon tables in the back of the 5e Dungeon Master’s Guide from @dndwizards is also helpful in this regard.
Saving for later
There’s a special method of Dungeon design that makes them very fun as well. Basically this method makes the Dungeon fun for ANY player, be it story focused, loot focused, or whatever else you got.
The way it works is it breaks down all of Dungeon crawling into four elements: lore, traps, treasure, & encounters.
This idea states that every room of your dungeon should have 3 of these four. That way every player has something to do.
Example:
You enter a simple rectangular chamber. The cold air washes over your skin sending goosebumps down your spine, no less than the sight of the eerie statue of a woman in the center of the room does. Her lifeless eyes stare down at a brazier in her hands, inside of which is a shining pile of gold. As you slowly approach to get a closer you look, you also spy two things. First, several crates in the back of the room, stacked in the corner. Second, the sound of scratching on stone, near yet muffled. What will you do?
In this example I have three elements present that the players don’t know but get a hint of.
I have treasure clearly in display for those who like loot.
The scratching sound implies combat. The fighters are ready and on edge waiting for something to jump them.
The smart players know that the statue isn’t gonna give away the gold for free. Especially after I called it “eerie.” So those who love a good puzzle or trap are now gonna go nuts looking for a trap on that statue.
As for what the trap is, it matters little. The gold could be covering a pressure plate and when removed it would open secret doors behind which would stand some horrid beast. To find it PCs would need some sort of a Investigation check or what not. The point is this situation provides 3 of 4 elements and entertains 3 out of 4 types of players.
And if you’re wondering what was up with the crates, those contain some minor loot. A potion or two, some gold. That’s for the players to not feel cheated out completely of their reward. Or you can make them mimics. PCs love mimics.
What do you guys think?
seebs recently had a really innovative dungeon in our saturday game: it had been deliberatly designed AS a dungeon, with traps etc., by an arrogant wizard(?) (we’re not sure what he was) as kind of a double dog dare to the sort of people who would take that kind of dare. seems the idea was to lure them in and kill them. if there was any real treasure there it was long gone, though, because it had been thoroughly beaten by an epic-level smartass long ago. she’d disabled a lot of the traps and left sarcastic comments spoilering others. THEN the ultra-epic wizard who’s kind of our postmortem mentor/nemesis used the geothermal heat from the volcano lair and hot springs, along with some of the water piping features the original dungeon builder had installed as traps, to build a massive power sink as part of the vast network of magic shielding he’d created, a thousand years ago, to save this one island from the apocalypse he’d forseen.
said apocalypse happened 5 minutes before the beginning of the game, btw. so now the fancy but mostly harmless water dungeon inside a volcano was full of superheated water contained by old and unstable bubble spells, and weird corrosive slimes mutated by the magic radiation, and a few traps that smartass epic girl had considered beneath her notice but that could still do a frighten to our mid-level party.
as experienced players, we have a tendency to meta-game dungeons. we know their rhythm, and can predict what they’ll try to do to us. this? we had NO IDEA what to expect!
at least one of the players was disappointed that there weren’t any monsters to fight, but i for one loved the way it made us have to engage in a fresh way. the point wasn’t to ‘clear’ the dungeon or get the treasure – it had been cleared ages ago, and there may never have been any treasure in the first place. our prize was information.
one of the weirdest ways that language is evolving in response to the internet is that “bad words” just. do not have the same impact anymore. i constantly forget that some people think ‘fuck you’ is a terrible insult
so threats and insults have to start getting really out there if the person wants to even mean anything. if a person told me to die i’d shrug it off but if i opened a post’s tags and saw “op i will sneak into your house and replace all your shoelaces with cooked pasta” do you know how shaken i’d be? do you know how upset i’d be if i saw “op is the personification of the look you share w other people in the grocery store when some dude is causing A Scene™
for no reason”
So you are saying English curses on the Internet are becoming more like Yiddish curses?
I sincerely hope so but I can’t say I’m familiar with yiddish curses and i am begging you to tell me a few
My Personal favorite is:
“May all your teeth fall out, except for one, to give you a toothache.”
Basically, the reason I prefer Freecell to Solitaire is that it’s been proven by exhaustion that 99.9% of Freecell hands are winnable, while Solitaire is impossible from the initial deal – i.e., such that no sequence of moves will result in victory – about two times in three, and I like to have confidence that my failures are due to my own incompetence rather than from being screwed before I ever began.
Organized Chaos 