#ttrpgs

[fandomsandhappiness]

starting a collection

[krakaheimr]

Earlier this year, Itch.io and Steam had to take down games due to pressure from companies like Mastercard, Visa, Paypal, and Stripe.

Mastercard, Visa, and other payment processors are still targeting material they deem obscene - whether or not it actually is.

We need to start calling again. Even if you don't like NSFW stuff or dislike porn - porn and nsfw is only the start of what they'll go after.

Among Mastercard's list of "high fraud risk" subjects in relation to Mastercard Threat Intelligence are the following:

Vtubing

Adult Content (which they define very loosely)

Tabletop Games

Video Games & their platforms

And likely more.

They're likely targeting political activism now in addition to this, and people who speak out against the companies. Notably now, Ana Valens is repeatedly having her payment processing accounts and platforms taken down or flagged as potential fraud - Buy Me A Coffee, Throne, Ko-Fi, Patreon - and in some cases, customer support from these platforms are citing information that hasn't been put on their platforms when explaining why they've targeted her accounts.

Completely SFW accounts of hers have been targeted, likely due to her speaking up about what the payment processors are doing and because of what she makes as a creative. She is at risk of debanking. (Edit: The old link now links to a deleted post. Here's a new one to the same person about the situation)

Ana Valens | 🔞 (@acvalens.com)

Paypros censorship 🧵 As you all know, I've faced significant stress this month from having various online accounts dinged in some shape or

This happening to her means that other creators - Vtubers, game devs of both video games and tabletop games, creatives, sex workers - are likely at risk of the same. For many, it's already happening to them.

Companies and corporations should not have the power to censor what people say and do, or where their money goes - political power like this should not lie in their hands.

We need to start calling the payment processors again and making noise. Contact people in your circles, talk to people, spread the word. Contact your representatives about censorship laws. Spend less money this holiday season.

This is not just about sex work or NSFW. This is about people's right to decide what they spend their money on, and in some cases, people's right to access their finances. It's about creative expression and whether or not what we make gets censored, about what we get to say online.

Below are some resources that include info on phone numbers to call, email addresses belonging to the offending companies, and how to call. Start making noise again. Focus on the fact that companies should not have this power over what people spend their money on, at all.

Protect Queer Creators and Sex Workers - Tell Payment Processors to STOP

TELL VISA, MASTERCARD, STRIPE, and PayPal to STOP

Dieselbrain (@dieselbrain.bsky.social)

#SaveSpeech starting Nov 1st we're entering the holiday season, which is a big stress point for big businesses like Mastercard and Visa. Th

[cosmichorrorlesbians]

ttrpg games are insane and make you insane in ways that are fundamental and irreparable. sometimes the best piece of fiction you will ever experience will happen to you and your friends over two to five years of your life. it will be your work and their work and yet somehow exist between and beyond you all. there will only be like three or five of you in the room and nobody else will ever be able to experience this in the way you did. it will be ephemeral and immediate and it will occasionally make you feel so bad you see hell. fuck. what a concept

[anim-ttrpgs]

There's this category of TTRPG where the seemingly only selling point besides maybe artwork is giving players permission to jerk off to their own moral purity as manifest from buying the TTRPG.

[ihaveatypeanditstrickstergods]

One of my favorite D&D gags that I ever came up with is part of a oneshot I've run a few times where the party is hired by a young wizard to help clear out a few active security measures in a tower that the wizard inherited from her old teacher.

The first obstacle to be cleared is the re-animated skeletons that the old wizard was using for gardening help. It's a pretty straightforward fight, but during the encounter, players may notice one particular raised bed of herbs that is set back in a corner of the garden by itself.

Upon further investigation, this one raised bed is absolutely shining with magical protections. There are runes carved into the wood of the bed, gemstones inlaid in the top of it, this bed is absolutely protected out the ass... and an arcana check shows that the protections are all pointed inward, attempting to keep what's in there from getting out.

What's growing in that raised bed, you may ask? What is so dangerous that the old wizard felt the need to place all these protections?

Mint.

[anxiousmimicrpgs]

One thing I've been doing for Girl Frame (my mechspoitation/lesbian mech pilot ttrpg) is basically trying to make rules for the characters that get in their way more than they help them

I've been reading Jay Dragon's Expressionist Manifesto, which talks about tension between what the player might want to do and the rules of the game. Rules not so much as an aid but as a restriction that has to be fought against or worked around to achieve your player goals

That led me to the special play for the Mockingbird Girl Playbook:

[rookthebird]

weirdest tabletop experience i ever had

be me in 2022

download a bundle of tabletop games at 3 am

find a giant pdf labeled "act one"

it's a game played by only exactly three people on different levels of reality.

you also play alternate universe versions of your characters on different levels in reality

secrets in the book are written in mirror writing

the whole book is an in-universe preserved text by someone in a different universe

i am so into this game.

best thing i've ever read.

i tell all my friends about it the next day.

"sounds cool, what's it called?"

i can find no evidence of this game.

i can find no evidence that this game ever existed.

i'm not even sure what bundle it was in.

all my friends develop the theory that this game is a dream i had.

they tease me about The Time Bird Dreamed An Entire TTRPG That Could Only Be Read In A Mirror

i find the game three years later

it's about dreams

anyway if you wished Invisible Sun was weirder you may enjoy Disparateum by Rathayibacter