Insights of a rather geeky guy

Comics, theatre, wrestling, anime, roleplaying games, larp and other geeky activities. He/Him

[prokopetz]

Inadvisable tabletop RPG jam premise #137: Game jam where each entry consists solely of paratextual discussion of the mechanics of a hypothetical or invented RPG; examples include an errata document, a developer Q&A, or a forum thread debating the correct interpretation of a particular rule.

[prokopetz]

@shoutyourporpoise replied:

I could SWEAR you’ve made this post before, or perhaps this is such a characteristically “you” concept that I already imagined a world in which you had

I don't think so, no. I did once (unintentionally) curate a game jam about writing supplements for invented or hypothetical games, the product of which you can find here, but this is a different thing.

[prokopetz]

(If anyone really wants this one to be a thing, though, feel free to toss your entry into the reblogs. I'm not going to do a proper game jam on itch.io or whatever because its UI really wants you to have cover art and a promotional blurb and such, and this doesn't feel like it warrants it!)

[peterssvensson]

Flow of Battle Errata 1.17

The Elemental Aura perk for the Blade Flower playbook may only be triggered once per turn. While summoning a blade and dismissing a blade are free actions, you cannot summon and dismiss a blade over and over again to re-trigger Elemental Aura to deal infinite Panic to a target.

The They're Already Dead perk for the Blade Flower playbook may only be triggered once per turn. While summoning a blade and dismissing a blade are free actions, you cannot summon and dismiss a blade over and over again to re-trigger They're Already Dead on a different opponent in the battle.

The Scimitar Dance perk for the Blade Flower playbook may only be triggered once per turn. While summoning a blade and dismissing a blade are free actions, you cannot summon and dismiss blades in both hands over and over again to stack infinite dance bonuses.

The Healing Embrace perk for the Shield Flower playbook may only be triggered once per turn. While summoning a shield and dismissing a shield are free actions, you cannot summon and dismiss a shield to re-trigger Healing Embrace to remove infinite Panic from a target.

The Fist Flower playbook can no longer take both the Stand In The Air and the Double Jump perks. You must choose one or the other.

The bonus action gained from Staff Flower playbook perk Hit Them Again cannot be used to trigger another Hit Them Again bonus action and deal infinite Panic to a target.

The Max Panic table on page 87 includes disarming in several entries. Disarming is now defined as being forced to dismiss your Flow weapon and not being able to summon it or any other Flow weapon or using any other Flow weapon, and shields count as weapons, until your character loses Panic.

The Dance Belt accessory is now the Dance Boots accessory.

[200-word-rpgs]

200 Word RPGs 2025

Each November, some people try to write a novel. Others would prefer to do as little writing as possible. For those who wish to challenge their ability to not write, we offer this alternative: producing a complete, playable roleplaying game in two hundred words or fewer.

This is the submission thread for the 2025 event, running from November 1st, 2025 through November 30th, 2025. Submission guidelines can be found in this blog's pinned post, here.

[peterssvensson]

Title: Kill Your Neighbor Author: Peter S. Svensson Archive OK! --- Each player comes up with an obnoxious attribute to apply to the awful neighbor.

Example: Takes your parking spot, doesn't clean after dog

Then, each player comes up with a character who is impacted by this terrible person.

Example: Writer living next door, delivery guy who is treated poorly

Each character has to allocate 6 points between their problem solving stances. Practical Improvisational Financial Physical Social Intellectual

Act One: Roleplay how these characters meet and commiserate about their mutual problem.

Act Two: Roleplay how they come up with a plan to humiliate, ruin or kill the awful neighbor.

Act Three: Roleplay how they execute said plan.

When a character attempts something risky, the Narrator may ask a player to roll a d6 then add whichever stance is relevant. The Narrator will pick a target number between 2 and 12 to determine the difficulty of the action. If the total is less than the target number, the character fails. Otherwise, it's a success.

There is no collaboration. Only one player gets to roll.

Once per game, a player may re-roll the dice if they come up with a clever flashback scene explaining how they are skilled at what they are doing.

[prokopetz]

I’ve taken a break from filling in examples and finally banged out that rewrite of Part Two: Priorities and Objectives that I’ve been promising to get around to for the last three revisions.

The old Part Two was the one remaining artefact of a much earlier and conspicuously more shitposty version of this document that lacked a proper Milieu section, which explains why it was full of redundancies, meme entries, and weirdly specific setting assumptions.

The new version is a complete refactoring that should be more flexible, less redundant, and less likely to conflict with your rolled Milieu elements; I have, however, taken the opportunity to insert several entirely new memes to replace the old ones.

Apart from that, not much has changed, so no detailed changelog this time. If you’d like to give it a spin (and please do!), the usual guidelines regarding playtesting feedback apply: you don’t need to do a full writeup – just a list of the numbers you rolled in each section and some brief thoughts on how it all fits together (or doesn’t) is great.

[peterssvensson]

Dramatis Personae - 6 -> Five political factions, all playable by default.

56 - Sports -> 4 - Professional Wrestlers

33 - Magic Users -> 6 - Wizards

26 - Fantastic Creatures -> 5 - Gnomes

24 - Entertainers - 4 -> Rock Stars

54 - Professions, Other - 5 -> Princesses

So with Professional Wrestlers and Rock Stars, I'm already leaning towards entertainment being a focus of the event, and Wizards and Princesses can easily be put into entertainment categories. Not quite sure how Gnomes will fit in, but that can wait. Priorities and Objectives - 5 -> Competing priorities players must negotiate

35 - Fulfill Your Destinies

vs

64 - Try To Survive

Try to survive, and fulfilling destines in conflict makes me think of victory or death in entertainment, which implies a reality TV show where the losers are killed ala Squid Game, in presumably some fantasy setting since we've got Gnomes, and I'm not quite ready to recontextualize them into something else, even if I have the option to.

Genre And Tone - 5 - A blend of …

54 - Romance

and

25 - Family Friendly/Young Adult Fiction

Okay, yeah, this seals it. Romance and YA Fiction get along fine, and this being a dark edgy reality show means that I can do Hunger Games sorts of "We fight within the system to over come it!" and "We have our passionate, yet family-friendly, romances between competitions!"

Rules Toys

45 - Metagame Shenanigans -> 2 - Genre Tropes

and

61 - Resource Economy -> 6- Reverse Death Spiral

I wasn't quite sure how to incorporate genre shifting into this, but eventually settle on PC control over the NPC Host, who dictates when they have another challenge, so that the players can shift the style of game from the romantic affairs and intrigues that happen in the opulent mansion where the players live in "Real World" style between competitions, and the more competitive fight for your life challenges when the players feel it's the appropriate time for the genre of the game to shift. There may also be rules about the Host being able to give parameters to specific events to likewise set guidelines for scenes. Reverse death spiral here is pretty simple. Players get Dazzle Points which they may use either to improve their odds at a competition or to impress their romantic interests, with increasing boosts as they use up the points, but they lose narrative control over character (likely dying, but DRAMATICALLY) when they finally run out. Gameplay will probably encourage players to save the last point for either a dramatic declaration of love near the end, or a major performance that wins them the games.

Milieu 6 -> The setting's three major realms, regions or polities

56 - Technology and Infrastructure -> 6 - Unusual Resource

11 - Features and Geography -> 2 - Crossroads

44 - Power and Politics -> 2- Dragons So at this point I feel obliged to use Dragons literally, rather than metaphorically. There is a family of immortal, wealthy Dragons who rules a powerful nation, and they're the sponsors of these Dragon Games where mortals compete for their entertainment. I'm going into cliches here, so the Dragons are obsessed with gold, and other financial wealth. So that's one nation, ruled by Dragons. Which suggests that the Unusual Resource is indeed gold, something rare and hard to find that the Dragons continue to be interested in. The Holes are a land of poverty, named such for the miners desperately trying to find any last grains of gold to trade to the Dragons for power, who have dug massive mines that litter the land. A place for poor people hoping to escape a cycle of poverty that might get swept up in these games in their tragic backstories. Then, we have the crossroads. This is the Mansion itself, where the Dragon Games are held, as the players have challenges and competitions brought to them directly. There's a large economy based on keeping the Mansion and the Games going, and it's pretty much a client state of the Dracoarchy. But theoretically the players could go to try and hold a revolution. Possibly build a barricade and wave a flag around dramatically. So now, with this in mind, I go back and look at the character archetypes/political factions. I decide that they represent the categories of competition, and that there's guild politics about who is talented enough to end up in the competition with a sincere chance at victory, and who gets sent there as a punishment to be eliminated in the first round. Teams form of people from different guilds, who may have solo competitions, but also work together on group projects as well. "Princesses" are fashion models (irrespective of gender identity, everyone is a princess when you're judged on your beauty!). "Gnomes" are comedians and clowns. "Wizards" are doing stage magic. "Rock Stars" are any sort of musician, and "Professional Wrestlers" are dancers and extreme athletes. So yes, this is a game about reality show competitors falling in love while surviving a cruel regime and trying to win the big prize, enough money to live comfortably for the rest of your days, or will they lead a REVOLUTION!? (cue spinning roses in the corners.)