January 2026 – Dan Q

Visualising Forged In The Dark probabilities

I was having trouble visualising the dice probabilities for some Forged in the Dark-based¹ RPGs², so I drew myself a diagram. I don’t know who, if anybody, would be interested in such a thing other than me… but that’s why we put these things online, right?

The general idea for Forged in the Dark action resolution is that you throw a number of six-sided dice representative of your chance of success³. You look at the highest value rolled in your dice pool, typically with most or all of the following effects:

1-3: Failure – depending on the circumstances you might be able to try again (with greater risk) and/or suffer some kind of consequence (a “harm” or “complication”).
4-5: Limited success – you succeed, but with come kind of consequence.
6: Success – you succeed!
Multiple 6s: Critical – you succeed, and it’s more-effective than you’d hoped or you gain some other benefit⁴.

If you’re playing Blades in the Dark or another Forged in the Dark-based game and find it useful to visualise how likely you are to get screwed-over by the dice… you’re welcome!

Footnotes

¹ Forged in the Dark is the name of the permissively-licensed SRD originally used for fantasy RPG Blades in the Dark, but it’s been used in plenty of other places too where its relatively fast-and-loose mechanics are best-suited. Sharp-eyed readers might have noticed this come up in a repost from last week, too…

² I may or may not be considering Forged in the Dark as the engine for a prototype RPG environment I’ve been half-heartedly constructing this winter…

³ A task for which you’ve prepared and have trained, in an area in which you’re skilled, and for which you’re well-equipped (e.g. an accomplished thief takes the time to carefully pick a basic lock using fine tools) is likely to involve rolling more dice than a less-fortunate individual.

⁴ I’m hugely grateful to AnyDice for helping with these calculations. Did you know that you need to be rolling ten six-sided dice before it becomes more-likely-than-not that there’ll be a double-six somewhere in there?

A small collection of text-only websites

This is a repost promoting content originally published elsewhere. See more things Dan's reposted.

…

I’m not saying the plain-text is the best web experience. But it is an experience. Perfect if you like your browsing fast, simple, and readable. There are no cookie banners, pop-ups, permission prompts, autoplaying videos, or garish colour schemes.

I’m certainly not the first person to do this, so I thought it might be fun to gather a list of websites which you browse in text-only mode.

…

Terence Eden, in A small collection of text-only websites

Terence Eden’s maintaining a list of websites that are presented as, or are wholly or partially available via, plain text. Obviously my own text/plain blog is among them, and is as far as I’m aware the only one to be entirely presented as text/plain.

Anyway, this inspired me to write a post of my own (on text/plain blog, of course!), in which I ask the question: what do we consider plain text? Based on the sites in the list, Markdown is permissible as plain text, (for the purposes of Terence’s list), but this implies that “plain text” is a spectrum of human-readability.

If Markdown’s fine, then presumably Gemtext would be too? How about BBCode? HTML and RTF are explicitly excluded by Terence’s rules, but I’d argue that HTML 1.0 could be more human-readable than some of the more-sophisticated dialects of BBCode (or any Markdown that contains tables, unless those tables are laid-out in a way that specifically facilitates human-readability)?

As I say in my post:

  <--  More human-readable                                              Less human-readable  -->  
|-----------|-----------|-----------|------------|-----------|-----------|-----------|-----------|
Plain text       Gemtext       Markdown        BBCode         HTML 1.0         Modern HTML     RTF

This provocation is only intended to get you to think about “what does it mean for a markup language to be ‘human readable’?” Where do you draw the line?

Tintern Abbey

Tintern Abbey’s looking especially beautiful in the fresh snow, this morning.

Invisible Dog

Our dog has decided that the perfect place to lie down at our holiday accommodation is… on a staircase whose carpet is the same colour as her!

I’m grateful for her very-visible blep… or I’d have tripped over this camouflaged pupper several times already!

Dan Q found GC47WME PYVW- Cuckoo Wood

This checkin to GC47WME PYVW- Cuckoo Wood reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs.

I was in these woods anyway, seeking GC10N80 (which, incidentally, is one of the best geocaches I’ve ever logged and well worth the attention of anybody ‘caching in this part if the world) and figured I’d come hunt for this cache too.

A quick find; my geosense spotted a candidate hiding place right from the main path, and I turned out to be right.

Cache contents are in somewhat poor condition: logbook has soaked and dried again into a slab of papier-mache and was challenging to sign!

TFTC!

Dan Q found GC10N80 Wye Eye

This checkin to GC10N80 Wye Eye reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs.

I’m on a family holiday, staying over in Catbrook, and I have a holiday tradition of getting up early (before the kids are up!) to come out on geocaching jaunts.

I very nearly didn’t consider this at all. It’s fake location, nestled amongst challenge caches (which I have no interest in whatsoever), made me initially suspect it would be another of the same. It’s only a lucky coincidence I clicked on it at all!

(Maybe that’s why this cache had no finds in 2025? Such a shame!)

But I’m glad I did. I puzzled over the riddle for a little while before the “odd line out” made me think of something. So confident was I in the resulting coordinates that I didn’t even visit the special web page to double-check, which meant I missed out on the object hint until I was in the field and needed one! This, in turn, was pretty satisfying!

I saved this cache for my second morning’s outing: free one on which I didn’t bring the dog (for whose little legs this hike might have been too intense). This was the right choice. I had to ford a flooded and frozen path by moonlight near Cleddon before a visit to the waterfalls (and the associated cache) then pressed on up into the woods to uncover this cache, which has sat alone and undisturbed for, what… 20 months?

Sun rising over a hill beyond a broad valley full of frozen fields. — The view from near the GZ is fantastic.

It’s in fine condition and in an absolutely postcard-perfect spot. The sun was at long last creating the hills on the far side of the valley as I signed my name and returned the box to its hiding spot. I really regret that this cache doesn’t see more footfall, and I hope that this effusive log (and the accompanying Favourite Point) might go some way to helping rectify that situation!

TFTC. It’s one of the best I’ve ever found. If I could award it two FPs I would!

Dan Q found GC39NPC Cleddon shoots and falls

This checkin to GC39NPC Cleddon shoots and falls reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs.

Hiked over from Catbrook on the way to a cache up Pen Y Fan and stopped by these beautiful waterfalls on the way. So glad I did! I’d originally planned to seek this cache on my return journey but I’ve got to say: it looked extra spectacular by the light of the full supermoon.

And as a bonus(?) I spent long enough hunting for the cache that I got to see it in daylight too!

The primary problem came from the fact that the path that the cache is nearest… is closed! Apparently a tree has fallen somewhere and rendered it unsafe, though that’s probably a long way from where the cache is hidden.

The secondary problem was that I didn’t read the sign. I just saw the fence, assumed that what I was looking at wasn’t the (closed) path but something completely out of bounds, and focused my search exclusively elsewhere. My GPSr had been fritzy all morning, so being “out” by 10-15m didn’t seem like a big deal.

It was only when I was considering returning during daylight hours that I stopped to read the sign and realised where the hinted path was: it’d been right in front of me the whole time! I quickly skirted the blockade and found the cache, then took the time – having already bypassed the fence – to snap a happy selfie by the falls in the early light.

Awesome adventure to a fabulous spot. FP awarded!

D&D 5e is not for everyone

This is a repost promoting content originally published elsewhere. See more things Dan's reposted.

…

In summary, 5e is for you if you

already use the system & don’t like learning new things,

enjoy medieval fantasy settings, with a 60-70% combat tilt,

like vague, unopinionated systems,

don’t mind overly corporate media,

just kinda like it (which is totally fair)

And if you do fit the bill here, I truly do wish you all the best in your 5e adventures…

But just because one system is for you, doesn’t mean others aren’t! pulls away curtain, exaggerated

…

As a quick disclaimer, this hobby, like many others, is a matter of taste. I, like everyone else, am biased towards a certain kind of game. Specifically, I absolutely adore games that place roleplay at center stage. Games that deal with the complexities of identity. Games with innovative mechanics. Games that present deep ethical quandaries. Games that make everyone at the table ponder something meaningful. If you like similar games, you’ll probably love my recommendations. If you don’t, then don’t worry! There are so many more games out there that will be for you and not for me, (5e included!), and I absolutely love that about this hobby.

I listed a good few options above, but also, I’d encourage you to take a gander at a few of the following games, most if not all of which I will write full reviews for eventually:

Spire: Rise against the oppressive high elves in a revolution destined for ruin, in an attempt to make a difference. Check out the fallout system in this one, it’s genuinely a game changer.

Blades in the Dark: Gang warfare: the game. Run a gang in a dark, steampunk, ghost-ridden world, and execute sick heists. Prep is for losers when in-scene you can just flashback to that time you prepared for this exact eventuality.

Slugblaster: TEENS ON HOVERBOARDS! DOIN’ SICK TRICKS! GOIN’ THROUGH PORTALS! GETTIN’ THAT SWEET SWEET INTERNET CLOUT! RUNNIN’ FROM INTERDIMENSIONAL POLICE! YEAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

Lichcraft: You’re trans and the wait for gender affirming healthcare is 300 years. Welp time to turn to the dark arts and become a lich!

Kai Koehler, in D&D 5e is not for everyone (with a few minor spelling corrections)

It saddens me a little that D&D (5e or whatever) is so-firmly entrenched as “the” default choice of TTRPG.

It’s fine, I guess (with the caveats above about what it’s best at and, by proxy, what it’s weaker at), and I’ve on many occasions enjoyed D&D both as a PC’s player and as a DM. But that it’s so much the de-facto standard that D&D is in many circles synonymous with roleplaying is… just a bit of a waste, really!

I love that Kai not only shares an explanation of these limitations but that they also go on to share a handful of recommendations of other games to consider, the next time the TTRPG itch gets you! I’d heard of Blades in the Dark (perhaps courtesy of the use of the Forged in the Dark engine in other games; I’m not certain), but the other three are completely alien to me… and they all sound great in different ways.

I wonder if I can persuade some Abnibbers to hook up for a mini-campaign/one-shot of Slugblaster or something at some point? Spire sounds great too, and I like the theme of Lichcraft: there’s some interesting ideas to explore in that universe!

Dan Q found GC7P0AN A Fine Pair # 1089 ~ Parkhouse

This checkin to GC7P0AN A Fine Pair # 1089 ~ Parkhouse reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs.

The geohound and I walked over from Catbrook this morning “the long way” – over the hill and woods, finding a couple of caches along the way – to this cache.

From both the cache type and my GPSr’s map data I fully expected to find a post box here alongside the (decrepit) red phone box, but it’s nowhere to be seen! Has it perhaps been removed?

Dan, a white man with blue hair, looks confused alongside a French Bulldog, in front of a red telephone box. — The dog and I spent a little while looking for the promised postbox, without success.

In any case, the hint reassured me that I was in the right place and my geosense told me where to look. A disappointingly tiny cache container (where a larger one could have probably been placed) was soon found, caked in mud, and replaced as-found.

TFTC.

Dan Q found GC2DJ9K The Wolf Cache

This checkin to GC2DJ9K The Wolf Cache reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs.

The geopup and I absolutely chose the right time to come up here on this wintery morning. The sun’s ascent over the valley whenever we escape the cover of the woods is absolutely spectacular.

Found without difficulty SL, TFTC!

Dan Q found GC2EFAW The Cairn Cache

This checkin to GC2EFAW The Cairn Cache reflects a geocaching.com log entry. See more of Dan's cache logs.

Happy New Year! The geopup and I, on holiday from West Oxfordshire and staying nearby, came out for a morning walk in the ice and snow today.

Our little Frenchie’s tiny legs made the work of climbing the stiles on this path a little challenging, but with persistence we were treated to a wonderful view of the sun broaching the horizon over the valley at the North end of School Wood.

Soon the cairn was in sight, and what a brilliant spot for a cache! Signed log, and dropped a travel bug that’s come all the way from Texas to continue its journey. FP awarded for bringing us out this way.

Roomscale VR Still Rocks

Over the Christmas break I dug out my old HTC Vive VR gear, which I got way back in the Spring of 2016. Graphics card technology having come a long way¹, it was now relatively simple to set up a fully-working “holodeck” in our living room with only a slight risk to the baubles on the Christmas tree.

For our younger child, this was his first experience of “roomscale VR”, which I maintain is the most magical thing about this specific kind of augmented reality. Six degrees of freedom for your head and each of your hands provides the critical level of immersion, for me.

And you know what: this ten-year-old hardware of mine still holds up and is still awesome!²

The kids and I have spent a few days dipping in and out of classics like theBlu, Beat Saber, Job Simulator, Vacation Simulator, Raw Data, and (in my case³) Half-Life: Alyx.

A tweenage girl in a black 'Hazbin Hotel' hoodie wears a VR headset; the screen behind her shows that she's drawn a picture featuring a rainbow background and the word 'CAR', while playing Job Simulator. — It doesn’t feel *too* heavy, but this first edition Vive sure is a *big* beast, isn’t it?

I’m moderately excited by the upcoming Steam Frame with its skinny headset, balanced weight, high-bandwidth wireless connectivity, foveated streaming, and built-in PC for basic gaming… but what’s with those controllers? Using AA batteries instead of a built-in rechargeable one feels like a step backwards, and the lack of a thumb “trackpad” seems a little limiting too. I’ll be waiting to see the reviews, thanks.

When I looked back at my blog to double-check that my Vive really is a decade old, I was reminded that I got it in the same month at Three Rings‘ 2016 hackathon, then called “DevCamp”, near Tintern⁴. This amused me, because I’m returning to Tintern this year, too, although on family holiday rather than Three Rings business. Maybe I’ll visit on a third occasion in another decade’s time, following another round of VR gaming?

Footnotes

¹ The then-high-end graphics card I used to use to drive this rig got replaced many years ago… and then that replacement card in turn got replaced recently, at which point it became a hand-me-down for our media centre PC in the living room.

² I’ve had the Vive hooked-up in the office since our house move in 2020, but there’s rarely been space for roomscale play there: just an occasional bit of Elite: Dangerous at my desk… which is still a good application of VR, but not remotely the same thing as being able to stand up and move around!

³ I figure Alyx be a little scary/intense for the kids, but I could be wrong. I think the biggest demonstration of how immersive the game can be in VR is the moment when you see how somebody can watch it played on the big screen and be fine but as soon as they’re in the headset and a combine zombie has you pinned-down in a railway carriage and it’s suddenly way too much!

⁴ Where, while doing a little geocaching, I messed-up a bonus cache’s coordinate calculation, realised my mistake, brute-forced the possible answers, narrowed it down to two… and then picked the wrong one and fell off a cliff.

Note #27831

Back at the Rollright Stones fire New Year’s Day, per family tradition. This year the younger child counted 74, the elder 59. The curse that prevents you counting the same number twice continues!