Something that occurred to me just this year: having an encyclopedic knowledge of RPGs hasn’t actually made me happier. In fact it’s probably made me less happy participating in my hobby, because I don’t share the same assumptions as the players with whom I spend most of my time. It’s given me all the tools… Continue reading The Usual Suspects
How little game can you get away with and still have an RPG session? And what will you learn when you play?
A cold hard fact from the Indie Game Reading Club: you can explore and play ttrpgs without ever mentioning, buying, reading, or playing the most popular game. Our hobby is so much more interesting and diverse than D&D. My list of on-ramps for the indie-curious: Fiasco (new card-driven version or OG): use prompts to sketch… Continue reading On-Ramps for Indie Hatchlings
While it’s true that virtually every RPG you’ll ever play will require rulings or some other human judgement, there are a few games out there that require improvised game design as part of the play experience. Or at least make it fun as hell. As I’ve written before, we’re in the midst of the Band… Continue reading Improvised Game Design
This morning I was chatting with a friend about how I actively dislike the thing in fantasy RPGs where a magic-using character’s player wants to learn a spell (in reference to this week’s post about Invisible Sun), and it lands in the GM’s lap to make that happen. It’s a really weird tic in my… Continue reading The Misery of Precedent
