Playing make-believe with my friends.

A place to post stories and thoughts from playing different TTRPGs. Main: @knapperigebotten

[schedulingisthefinalboss]

Tags on this blog.

thoughts; Posts where I type out my thoughts on certain games, mechanics, ideas, what have you.

stories; Posts where I tell stories that happened either in-game, or during game sessions.

[game specific tag]; Every post will be tagged with the name of the game I'm talking about.

ttrpg; Most posts will be tagged TTRPG, because they're about TTRPGs. Reblogs will not be tagged TTRPG, to keep them separate.

reblog; Reblogs will be tagged.

[theresattrpgforthat]

Hey - You Should Check Out My Character Sheets

I've been making character sheets for various roleplaying games over the past few years, and I've gotten pretty fucking good at it. I've got everything from small, simple, sheets...

...to complex beasts with clocks that tick and self-populating sections that pull from numbers you put in specific boxes.

I've got big, trad-like games with lots of pieces...

...and more abstract story-games.

And I include more than just character sheets! I include mission clocks, world-building tools...

... and safety sheets with a list of common safety tools!

So check out my play-kits - you might find that game you want to play just a little bit easier to do!

[kierongillen]

General Player Advice For RPGs

I published this in my newsletter here a while back, and discourse reminded me I wanted to put it more public. I probably should get around to actually doing a proper blog for this kind of stuff. You can sign up to the newsletter here.

One of the things which I’ve been chewing over since getting back into RPGs is that there’s so much advice for GMs and so little advice for players. I keep thinking over why - though the whys aren’t what I’m about to write about. However, some other folk think any worthwhile advice is system/genre specific.

This got me chewing over whether I agree with that. As the list below shows, I don’t.

The first four are ones where I think I succeeded, and as principles generally guide you towards better play no matter what game you’re playing. The last three are mainly applicable to games with a significant story component (the last especially). There’s a few more I played with, but they were more about being a good at the table generally – about being a better player in any game rather than specifically about role-playing games. I also avoided ones which were more GM-and-player advice rather than just player advice (if there’s a problem in game, communicate out of game, use appropriate safety tools, etc).

I also didn’t include “Buy The GM Stuff”.

Anyway – here they are. See what you think.

GENERAL PLAYER PRINCIPLES FOR BETTER PLAY

1) Make choices that support the table’s creative goals

If you’re playing a storygame, don’t treat it like a tactical wargame. If you’re playing a tactical wargame, don’t treat it like a storygame. If it’s bleak horror, don’t make jokes. If you’re in a camp cosy romp, don’t bring in horror. It also varies from moment to moment – if someone’s scene is sincere, don’t undercut it.

2) Be A Fan of The Other Characters

This is GM advice in almost all Powered By the Apocalypse games – for the GM to be a fan of the characters. It’s a good trait for a player to cultivate. Be actively excited and interested in the other characters’ triumphs and disasters. Cheer them on. Feel for them. Players being excited for other players always makes the game better. Players turning off until it’s their turn always makes it worse.

3) Be aware of the amount of spotlight time you’re taking

This is a hard one for fellow ADHD-ers, but have an awareness of who is speaking more and who is speaking less. A standard GM skill is moving spotlight time around to players who have had less time. Really good players do this too. Pass the ball.

4) Learn what rules apply to you, to smooth the game, not derail it.

To stress, this isn’t “come to the table knowing everything” but learning the rules that are relevant to your character along the way, especially if they are marginal (looking at you, Grappling and Alchemy rules). Doing otherwise adds to the facilitator’s cognitive load and hurts the game’s flow. The flip is being aware that knowing stuff isn’t an excuse to break the game’s flow with a rules debate either – that’s an extension of the third principle.

5) Make choices which support other characters’ reality

If someone’s playing a scary bastard, treat them like a scary bastard. If they’re meant to be the leader, have your character treat them like the leader , for better or worse. A fictional reality is shared, and you construct it together.

6) Ensure The Group Understands Who Your Character Is

This is the flip of the above – having a character conception that is clear enough that everyone gets who you are, what you want to do and how you want to do it. If you don’t, the table will be incapable of supporting your choices. This links to…

7) If asked a preference in a story game, a strong choice is almost always better than a middling choice.

Don’t equivocate. If asked “You’ve met this person before. How do you feel about him?” either “I love him” or “I hate him” is better than anything middling. The exception is if it’s something you’re really not interested in pursuing.

[theresattrpgforthat]

Hello!! Do you know any TTRPGs surrounding translation or languages? 😊 (thanks for all your work btw!!!)

THEME: Language / Translation Games

Hello friend! As someone who studied linguistics in university, I absolutely love talking about all of the funky things languages do! I hope these recommendations tickle your fancy!

Dialect, by Thorny Games.

Dialect is a game about an isolated community, their language, and what it means for that language to be lost. In this game, you’ll tell the story of the Isolation by building their language. New words will come from the fundamental aspects of the community: who they are, what they believe in, and how they respond to a changing world.

Dialect uses a deck of cards to help minimize the amount of choices you have to make in character creation, by dealing three cards to each player and having the players choose one from just those three. You track the change of your language over a series of turns, using prompts to help you navigate the conversations that arise in your community as the world around them changes.

Dialect has been very highly regarded as a game that really delivers on the experience that it promises. The grief that accompanies language death really shines through this game, so if you want to combine the wonder of creation with the pain of losing something so integral to your sense of being, this is the game for you.

Tiny Frog Wizards, by @prokopetz

You have mastered the secret arts of sorcery

The very primordial energies of creation and destruction are yours to wield as you will.

You are two inches tall.

Tiny Frog Wizards is a game about tiny frogs, wielding magic using the power of words. When you want to do something magical, you will roll somewhere between 1-3 dice, and use the values of your rolled dice to determine how the range, magnitude, and control of your magic.

What’s important in terms of this game recommendation is the Control aspect, because how well you are able to wield your magic depends on how many words you are able to use to make things happen! It’s a lot easier to use a spell with precision if you have enough words to detail where you want a magical pen to write, or what you want to throw a tiny magic missile at. Not enough words? Then the GM has license to cause some humorous side effects, or, if you roll poorly enough, cause your spells to really go off the rails.

If you like games where you need to choose your words carefully, Tiny Frog Wizards is worth checking out - especially since it’s in free playtest!

Xenolanguage, by Thorny Games.

Xenolanguage is a tabletop role-playing game about first contact with alien life, messy human relationships and what happens when they mix together.  At its core, you explore your pivotal relationships with others on the mission as you uncover meaning in an alien language. The game gives a nod to soulful sci-fi media like Arrival, Story of Your Life and Contact, but tells its own story. It’s a game for 2-4 players in 3-4 hours.

In Xenolangauge, you play as a group of people bound together through a shared past with unsettled questions. Your task is to understand why the aliens have come and what they are trying to tell us. You will soon discover the key to understanding lies in your memories together.

This is definitely an in-person game, as it is meant to come with a modular channeling board that will provide you with alien symbols that you will use to help you interpret messages. This is more than a game about language, it’s about relationship, shared memories, and connection.

Xenolanguage was kickstarted at the beginning of this year, but you can check out the above link to pre-order the game if this sounds interesting to you!

Star-Spawned, by Penguin King Games.

One unearthly night, a ray of colourless light descended from the stars, and under its warping radiance, creatures unlike any the world has ever seen were born. They do not know the world, and they do not know themselves. Unfortunately for the world, they're quick learners!

Star-Spawned is a GMless, oneshot-oriented tabletop RPG in which you don't know what your own traits do when play begins. The names of each group's stats are randomly generated using morpheme chaining, and characters are created while having absolutely no idea what they mean; figuring that out forms the greater part of play.

Star-Spawned is more about self discovery than it is about language, but the use of morpheme-chaining in character creation is intriguing to me. You will randomly roll three pieces of a word, and then chain them together to create a unique Facet, available to the players as stats. These Facets don’t have a meaning when the game begins - you need to play to find out what they mean. If you like playing around with semantics - the meaning of words - this might be a game for you.

Degenerate Semantics, by Mikael Andersson.

Degenerate Semantics is a role-playing game for 1-5 players and one Game Master (GM). The players will each portray a character who live in Emmaloopen's poverty-stricken lower city. They are young, wild, ambitious, and independent. This way of life is threatened by other factions, and the players will need to have their characters work together to survive and thrive.

In the process of playing the game, the players and GM will define and flesh out a language called Bandethal. A collection of street terms and slang, Bandethal is used both as a way to talk openly about illicit activities without alerting authorities and to establish street cred. The terms are liberally mixed in with plain English, or when the language is mature enough, can be used entirely on its own. The characters' success is in large part based on how proficiently the players wield the language.

A friend of mine ran this game for me three or four years ago, and it’s been sitting in the back of my head ever since. Degenerate Semantics was created for a Game Chef competition in 2014, and has remained in the same state since then. I don’t think there’s any more work being done on it, but the game is there for anyone who wants to give it a go - and while there’s a setting that comes with the game, that setting is highly flexible, depending on what your group is interested in. Our group decided to use a lot of gardening metaphors, and undertook a plant-based heist as our act of rebellion! If you want a game about the power that language can give a tightly-knit group, this is the game for you.

I've Also Recommended...

DROWWORD, by Ursidice.

[official-linguistics-post]

official linguistics post

[prokopetz]

Though the proverbial "showdown at high noon" is largely a media invention, many famous gunslingers of the American Old West did engage in formal duels at least occasionally. The main differences from the popular media version are twofold:

Formal duels were rare; most famous gunslingers duelled only once or twice in their entire careers, and a gunslinger with three or more duels under their belt would have been considered extraordinarily prolific (and also extraordinarily stupid – see below);

Those gunslingers who did duel typically made a point of accepting challenges only from opponents of demonstrably inferior skill; there was something of an unspoken agreement among prolific duellists to avoid duelling each other by any means necessary, as they knew the surest way to cut short one's career was to duel someone who actually knew what they were doing!

Anyway, the reason I bring this up is because some day I want to write a semi-competitive tabletop RPG where the player characters are all rival gunslingers living the high life on manufactured drama and exaggerated tales of their legendary prowess while going to elaborate lengths to avoid having to actually fight each other.

[prokopetz]

(The mechanics for the social side of play would involve a blackjack variant with light deck-building elements and a heavy emphasis on bluffing and concealed information. The combat/duelling mechanics would just be "both sides flip a coin, and if your coin comes up tails you die", with duels where both parties eat dirt explicitly permitted.)

[petterwass]

I could also see very elaborate kayfabe with fake injuries being a thing

[prokopetz]

Throwing away your shot allows your opponent to forego their coin flip, but you have no particular means of obliging them to do the same for you – get a little Prisoner's Dilemma action going. If you're trying to conceal the fact that you deliberately missed, the blackjack minigame is used to determine how well you sell it to any onlookers.

[prokopetz]

One may ask, if the gunslingers in this game have the goal of avoiding any actual gunslinging, how do they support themselves financially? Well, based on the history of the period, several possibilities naturally offer themselves (presented as a d6 table for your convenience):

You're employed in law enforcement, likely as a sheriff or bounty hunter. Complication: one of the other player characters is your current target; the others don't initially know which of them it is.

You're employed in some other skilled profession – for example, as a lawyer, or perhaps as a dentist. Complication: you need to spend a significant portion of your downtime actually doing your job.

You're the leader of a criminal gang. Complication: your boys are also in town, and you're liable to be dragged into the fallout of their various drunken misdeeds.

You subsist on publisher's fees from selling purple-prosed – and largely fabricated – stories of your adventures. Complication: your reputation is vulnerable to debunking.

You perform trick-shooting exhibitions as part of a travelling show. Complication: you're unable to keep a low profile; the other player characters always know where you are and what you're doing.

You rely on the patronage of well-heeled widows or other women of means; in modern terms, you're supported by one or more wealthy sugar mommies. Complication: hoo, boy.

[prokopetz]

(The last option would of course be available regardless of the gender of the player character in question. I'm not personally aware of any female gunslingers who historically enjoyed that particular arrangement, but certain liberties must be taken for the sake of play.)

[shroudofnerscylla]

I thought this was a fun idea so I threw together a document for playing this, linked here. I decided to base the social side of the game on poker instead of blackjack, with a bit of inspiration from Balatro. The structure of the game itself is roughly inspired by Shinobigami. Hasn't been play tested yet, but I'd love any feedback, especially regarding GM resources that would be helpful and balancing suggestions regarding the deck-building aspects of the game.

[schedulingisthefinalboss]

GM-less play.

I played GM-less for the first time recently! Me and the two guys I usually play Achtung! Cthulhu with wanted something else, and we seemed to be in a bit of an Avatar: The Last Airbender mood, but I am not a big fan of Avatar Legends personally.

Luckily, I have a giant pile of rules-light, setting-ambiguous game systems! The one I ended up picking was Paper-Free RPG by D.L. Juwelgeist, which, I seemed to recall, suggests GM-less play as an option. Being a forever GM, I was obviously pretty excited about the prospect! The other two agreed and we had a pretty good time just improvising.

As for the game itself, I played an earthbender, the other two played waterbenders. Waterbender A was a wise guru from the Foggy Swamp, whom I and Waterbender B travelled far and wide to learn from. This led pretty naturally into Waterbender A taking up a sort of pseudo-GM role, in the sense that he decided where we went and what we did there. From what I've read, that's fairly standard for GM-less games, players taking turns with which character takes charge for the time being.

[thydungeongal]

I've briefly touched upon this topic before but here goes; I know you can play D&D for pretty much free because it's extremely easy to pirate, but I think we've settled by now that piracy doesn't actually hurt companies as much as they want us to think, meaning that pirating D&D isn't as big of a "stick it to WotC" move as it's often presented as. Of course if you absolutely have to play D&D (but, like, why?) you won't get any moralizing from me about piracy, like, ever.

But the point is: supporting another game either monetarily or with your valuable time is a much more direct and tangible way to stick it to the cultural monopoly of D&D than playing D&D and not paying WotC. I mean if it's another big-ish publisher I don't have a lot of faith in their working conditions being much better than WotC's, but in some cases it probably is so. As it often happens, the market leader can often afford to pay its employees worse simply due to those positions being more desirable.

But anyway who cares, there's lots of games out there where you can actually get a full game sometimes for less than the cost of a single D&D book and since those games are often built as more focused experiences than the D&D "forever game" formula you're actually more likely to get to experience all of the game instead of a lot of the content existing just as shadows on the cave wall.

[dailyadventureprompts]

This actually brings up something I am most passionate about when getting people into the hobby: D&D books (at least those made by Wotc) are a scam.

They offer minimal content in a badly curated format, filling up the rest of their space with bloat and flashy production value. As Evidence I will always point to the fact that the section on building Dungeons in the Dungeonmaster's guide, the book that is supposed to teach you how to play the game is only 6 out of the book's 320 pages, and 90% of it is filled with random tables and art.

It's the same candy coated emptiness as a bad marvel movie, and the reasoning is much the same: d&d books arn't game expansions the same way that marvel movies aren't works of art, they're products first and foremost, churned out on a predictable schedule to keep stockholder value high. They're set up to prey on the nerd instincts of completionism and merch acquisition, exploiting your love of the IP to ensure your quarterly tithe to the hasbro corporation.

This is why it always makes me so sad when I meet a new person or find a new youtuber and see that they've got a shelf full of WotC books. The company exploited their love of the game to con them out of hundreds of dollars that could have been spent on things that actually improve their gaming experience like dice, or snacks or 3rd party pdfs or (like dungeongal suggested) books that contained ACTUAL content.

It's another first principle thing that I think we in the TTRPG space need to internalize and pass on to our friends and especially the new players we teach: friends don't let friends waste money

[mortimermcmirestinks]

if, after reading the well-written above reply from @dailyadventureprompts, you want access to all the rules of D&D without needing to pay jack shit for books, might I recommend the following:

The 5e wikidot has almost everything in terms of reference material (classes, races, weapons, armor, magic items, backgrounds, etc etc etc), and

Roll20 - Compendium and Rule Set Directory

Browse and reference your favorite RPG rule sets for systems including D&D, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, and Cyberpunk RED.

the 5e compendium on Roll20 has all the detailed rules and stuff

[imsobadatnicknames2]

Not hating or saying that this is wrong, because piracy and copyright infringement will ALWAYS be cool in my book but like.

If the post is about how ppl who care about sticking it to WotC should devote more time and effort to sharing resources, cool stories, and generally just bringing more attention to and talking more about non-D&D games because otherwise (even if they're not paying for any D&D material) they're still helping WotC's cultural monopoly by keeping attention focused on 5e's product ecosystem, then I think sharing a link to where to find 5e for free is kinda missing the point a little bit. Like I fully support it but I think in this specific instance sharing this is a little bit counterproductive to OP's point.

[thydungeongal]

Yeah and like... Again, not spending money on D&D is of course better than spending money on D&D if one doesn't want to actively contribute to D&D's position as the RPG monolith. But having yet another post about how people maybe should consider playing other games and supporting the wider TTRPG ecosystem be turned into "and you can play D&D for free!" in the comments is actually a really apt demonstration of the wider point about D&D's overwhelming cultural dominance.

[theinstagrahame]

Honestly I'll go ahead and say it: seeing the original post and responding with "here's how you can play for free" is entirely missing the point.

You're in a game group, you're one person of like a half-dozen or so. Maybe you're frustrated with Wizards and their various problems (like their Pinkertons contracts, or the OGL thing). But you're not giving them any money.

But your game group is Playing D&D. And your other five friends are not necessarily in the same headspace regarding the company and its various issues. They're going out and telling people about their D&D game, they're maybe thinking about running one with another friend group, they're maybe buying the books, or the t shirts, or whatever.

Which is what Wizards wants. That's how they get the word-of-mouth advertising. That's how they get into people's heads, so when they're at the game store, they go "well, so-and-so is playing it, so it must be good!"

Which like, if you don't really care about supporting WotC isn't a problem. But if you're specifically against the things they do (like the time they gave an abuser the names of people who'd accused him of abuse), then continuing to play it is still supporting WotC.

It's up to you, I'm not gonna tell you what to play. But... D&D already assumes that not everyone is getting the books. So, your pirating their books is sorta already in their calculations.

[imsobadatnicknames2]

ur tabletop takes are fucking insufferable i can't stand the constant 5e hate coming from u and ur cliquewhat does it matter if i want to use 5e to play everying, do u want me to learn a new game for every setting? let people play what they want, u have no right to tell me what to play

Lemme screenshot something real quick.

Like. If you find my opinions so insufferable then good news! you aren’t forced to look at my blog or the blog of any of the handful of intense weirdos who agree with me. Blogs that post nothing but 5e content outnumber us dozens to one, go follow those instead.

WotC has largely succeeded in getting every mainstream space within this hobby to cater to people who think exactly like you. The idea that it’s okay to never branch out from d&d and you can hack d&d for any setting you wanna play doesn’t need to be defended, it’s the default opinion in this hobby.

Go to any popular tabletop space and the most common response you’ll find to “i want to play a game set in ______” is “here’s how to reskin d&d for it”. Many publishers are releasing 5e conversions of their non-d&d games, or straight up ditching their own in-house systems in favor of 5e because they know they won’t sell enough to stay afloat otherwise. Go to the RPG section of a bookstore and non-5e material will take up at best a tiny fraction of the shelf space if there is any at all.

You won. Your opinion is the dominant one and still you can’t resist the urge to butt in on the little spaces that people who don’t agree with it have carved for ourselves just to rile yourself up about the fact that we don’t share the dominant opinion in the hobby.

[imsobadatnicknames2]

I know you’re agreeing with me but referring to the entire hobby of tabletop RPGs as “d&d versions” on a post where I specifically complain about the cultural stranglehold that D&D has on the hobby sure is uh… something.

[imsobadatnicknames2]

Like idk chief imagine if you made a post complaining about your thing and I came into it calling all animated movies “Spiderverses”

[unseenphil]

I think the strongest evidence of D&D eating up other RPG spaces for me, personally, is that there’s a podcast out there based on some of my writing here on tumblr.com that I used for a sourcebook for FIST.

The podcast is 5E, is on spotify and apple, and has a second season coming up.

The sourcebook’s made about 30 bucks on itch.io.

[thydungeongal]

I've briefly touched upon this topic before but here goes; I know you can play D&D for pretty much free because it's extremely easy to pirate, but I think we've settled by now that piracy doesn't actually hurt companies as much as they want us to think, meaning that pirating D&D isn't as big of a "stick it to WotC" move as it's often presented as. Of course if you absolutely have to play D&D (but, like, why?) you won't get any moralizing from me about piracy, like, ever.

But the point is: supporting another game either monetarily or with your valuable time is a much more direct and tangible way to stick it to the cultural monopoly of D&D than playing D&D and not paying WotC. I mean if it's another big-ish publisher I don't have a lot of faith in their working conditions being much better than WotC's, but in some cases it probably is so. As it often happens, the market leader can often afford to pay its employees worse simply due to those positions being more desirable.

But anyway who cares, there's lots of games out there where you can actually get a full game sometimes for less than the cost of a single D&D book and since those games are often built as more focused experiences than the D&D "forever game" formula you're actually more likely to get to experience all of the game instead of a lot of the content existing just as shadows on the cave wall.

[drakeanddice]

Supporting indie games and indie game makers monetarily is great. I love when y'all do that. But you know what I love just as much?

When y'all talk about my games (or any indie game), share stories about playing my games.

D&D game tales and discussion is everywhere. There's this feeling of a vast smothering blanket shading out the whole garden. It's everywhere. Mountains of discussion and content and reminiscing about your 8th level paladin or whatever. Theory crafting, homebrew (man, I do not like that word), world building. A thick canopy over small sprouts, omnipresent and seemingly omnipotent, making even the struggle to bloom seem pointless.

When I hear someone talking about a little indie game that could, I can feel the sunlight for a minute.

[theamazingpat]

Hey! I really wanna start playing something other than dnd with my friends, could you guys give us some recommendations?

[ostrichmonkey-games]

@theresattrpgforthat, @haveyouplayedthisttrpg, and @indie-ttrpg-of-the-day are all doing some great work at highlighting a ton of different games. Great way to just start perusing and seeing what's out there and what might work for your group

Best thing to do is really just have a discussion about what you and your friends find fun about ttrpgs, and then using those as a starting point to look for other games!

[astercrash]

https://astercrash.itch.io/simple-mystery-engine

I have a new game out!

Feel like running a cosmic horror tabletop game but don't want to learn a complicated new system?

Simple Mystery Engine is a rules-light roleplaying game built to help quickly create and play episodic mysteries in the vein of monster-of-the-week TV shows and pulp horror novels.

Players will take on the roles of Investigators, wavering between Rationality and Irrationality, capable of solving the mystery only by balancing these extremes.­­

Including instructions for character creation, gameplay and straightforward instructions on how to prep for a mystery game, Simple Mystery Engine is built to get you from not playing a game to playing a game as quickly and smoothly as possible.

No commitment required, Simple Mystery Engine is free to download and fun to play. Take a look today!

[prokopetz]

Tumblr 200-Word RPGs 2023

Last November, we did an informal game jam for folks who wanted to write something for Writing Month, but would prefer to write fewer than fifty thousand words of it. You can find the complete list of participants for that event in this post here. There's also an off-Tumblr archive of entries whose authors gave permission for them to be preserved here, if any of those links turn out to be broken.

Last year's collaboration went over well enough that I thought we might dust it off again this year. To be clear, this is just for fun – it's not a curated jam, and nobody's judging winners or handing out prizes..

If you'd like to throw your hat in, just follow these steps:

Step 1: If you're unfamiliar with 200-word RPGs, read a bunch of last year's entries (linked above) or browse the 200 Word RPG Challege archives at https://200wordrpg.github.io/ to get your brain-meats properly configured.

Step 2: Write your own 200-word RPG. If you're not sure whether you have 200 words or not (and with RPGs it can genuinely be difficult to tell!), you can use the word counter at https://200wordrpg.github.io/wordcount to check.

Step 3: Reblog this post and append your 200-word RPG.

Step 4 (optional): Please indicate in your post whether you're okay with having your 200-word RPG archived off-site for posterity – if you don't say anything one way or the other, I'll assume the answer is "no".

(As before, as a courtesy to anyone who's creeping the notes, please restrict non-200-word-RPG commentary to replies and tags until November 2023 is over – let's make the actual games easy to find!)

[paradoxius]

Guide, Soldier, Mystic, Thief

Setup

Which is your profession? (see title) What do you look like? What do you carry? What do they call you?

Form a party. What kind of journey are you on together?

Play

When you...

...arrive in a new place: Guide, where are you, and what must be done to get through this place? Soldier, what is the greatest danger here, and how must it be combated?

...linger long in a place and face its dangers: Mystic, what secret lurks here, and what must be done because of it?

....speed soon from a place and avoid its dangers: Thief, how would you take advantage of the party’s trust, and what must be done to stop you?

....must act: Roll one die*, plus another if you lack needed equipment, plus another if your profession ill suits the task, plus another if you haven’t tried before, plus another if no one helps you. If you roll a one, you fail and the relevant profession is asked the consequences.

*With six sides, plus two for each redundant relevant professional.

When your party lacks the profession asked a question, answer together. The truth will turn out to be worse.

----- This can be archived off-site.

This was interesting to work out. The initial idea was to as much as possible create a standard party-of-adventurers-with-classes game within the 200 word limit. I realized in order to make that possible I would either have to rely on my prospective players already knowing how such a game works, and on my prospective GM making up most of the game without guidance*, or significantly reshaping the GM role. I opted for the latter and took inspiration from many games that break up conventional GMing responsibilities between players (Dream Apart/Askew, WTF, Fellowship) but did something I haven't seen much, which is to tie different types of creative work to the classes most suited to deal with them—fighter describes the enemies, ranger describes the terrain, etc. Also, I think mechanically implementing mandatory PvP is funny.

195 words because I couldn't think of a title until the last second and decided to just pull the class list out of the rules text for it.

*And if I had done this, the game would have only taken about 25 words ("All but GM create characters. GM describes challenges. Others describe reactions and roll. On 4-6, GM describes success. On 1-3 GM describes failure.") which made it feel against the spirit of the prompt.

[schedulingisthefinalboss]

"Investigating The Throbbing Sausage"

The Gobfather - Episode 1

A GM's retelling of a game session, the first of the campaign, written from the perspective of an NPC in the game. As this session took place several weeks (or months? I don't remember) ago, some details might be off.

-

We've put together a real crack team here. Anton Yokonovich, a local smith with a bone to pick, and Fernando Simonelli, an ex-member of the mob, led by detectives Calin Withakay and Pric.

I'll be honest, I had my doubts about involving a civilian into this operation, but Mr. Yokonovich seemed adamant, I gave them the go-ahead. Our ultimate goal is to apprehend and charge Achille Giuliano, colloquially known as The Gobfather.

Simonelli gave us a good lead to start our investigation with, it seems one Elvino D'orto, known to most as Throbbing Elvino, became somewhat disillusioned with the mob as a whole, he'd be likely to cooperate. There was no doubt in my mind that his restaurant, The Throbbing Sausage, served as some sort of front, although I'm not sure in what exact capacity.

After some briefing, the investigation was ready to begin. Everything started out exactly as planned, the group enters, orders food and drinks like usual, try to find out where exactly D'Orto might be. Eventually, unfortunately, everything went sour real hard, real fast.

After having aroused some suspicion with the staff, the team opted for a more direct approach to investigation, and this resulted in a brawl. We know this happened, because some customers and regular staff reported it to us.

However, although they caused some noise, the team was able to hash out a deal with D'orto, giving us valuable information into the inner workings of the mob. To gain the respect of Giuliano, anyone must first compete in a fighting ring, ran by one Tommy Lenza, otherwise known as The Chelaxian -- I suppose that explains why he runs the fighting rings.

We shall see soon how this next assignment pans out for our team. In any case, we'll be keeping a closer eye on them from now on.

-

[prokopetz]

The Gremlin Game Designer's Creed

Rules are toys, and the process of rules-mediated play consists of smashing their faces together like little girls making their Barbies make out. Unless a rules module is explicitly intended to be enacted solo, it should present a generous surface area for other rules to bite into. The most elegantly self-contained piece of rules design is, collaboratively speaking, also the most useless.

The principal function of "player characters" as discrete collections of mechanical traits is to furnish each player with an assemblage of shiny things to show off to other players. Mechanical abstraction is well and good, but if you abstract away the act of curating one's collection of shinies, player engagement will suffer.

The GM, if present, is a fellow player. Ensure that they have their own toys and shinies to play with. The failure of a game to provide these is often a major contributor to why nobody wants to run it!

The most effective way of encouraging players to do what you want is to make a number go up. This applies to both to rewards and to misfortunes; a number counting up to disaster a much more visceral motivator than a number counting down to zero.

Crunch is good. The defining feature of tabletop roleplaying is that rules produce stories. The act of interpreting the outputs of the rules and the act of telling the game's story are the same activity. Be mindful of what kinds of stories your rules want to tell; you may find that their opinion on the matter differs from your own!

Actually assembling your game's rules is as much a process of discovery as it is of invention. In the course of designing and playtesting, you may find that your own game has rules that you didn't know about. Where did they come from? It is a mystery.

Randomised outcomes should be made mandatory with care and restraint; randomised outcomes should be made available with delirious abandon. As far as is practicable, players should always have the option of asking the dice what unhinged bullshit should happen next. Corollary: lookup tables are your friend.

Players don't need your permission to depart from the rules as written; granting it is arrogant. By the same token, however, it should never be unclear to players whether they're departing from the rules as written. Let the thought process behind what you're writing hang out for all the world to see; folks will be rummaging in the game's guts anyway, so give them easy access.

If your game has a default setting, explain it as little as possible, but always let the rules and presentation reflect it. Seeing an entry for "poorly made dwarf" in a table of player character backgrounds will fire a group's imagination more strongly in three words than a chapter stuffed with worldbuilding lore could in ten thousand.

You don't need to be good at naming things as long as you're good at puns. Wordplay, alliteration and rhyme may also serve in this capacity, as, in a pinch, may a well placed dick joke.

[indierpgnewsletter]

Thinking about this!

[indierpgnewsletter]

Okay, I'm going to think outloud about this now:

1. Rules are toys, and the process of rules-mediated play consists of smashing their faces together like little girls making their Barbies make out. Unless a rules module is explicitly intended to be enacted solo, it should present a generous surface area for other rules to bite into. The most elegantly self-contained piece of rules design is, collaboratively speaking, also the most useless.

This is a complex two-part statement. First, "Rules are toys", which is already a big claim. A gremlin game designer becomes someone who sees new games (new "systems") in the same way as they might see new recipes - opportunities for new experiences. This is as opposed to the camp that understand game rules as an extension of rules parents might give to a child - roadbumps in the journey to some spontaneous, organic fun.

(Further reading: Vincent Baker on RPG Essentialism and RPG Exceptionalism).

Secondly, there is the idea that good rules are completely enmeshed with other rules. Good design is when rules are interlocked with each other. The big thing that finds itself staring down the barrel of this statement is dangling subsystems. Grapple rules in D&D3.5 for example or initiative systems that employ procedure used nowhere else in the game.

But I'm not sure how this principle interacts with the idea of mini-games though. A mini-game is a kind of subsystem. But the difference between Firebrands' mini-games and D&D's Grapple is huge. I don't know how best to articulate it but the difference is that Firebrands' mini-games rhyme with each other in a way that Grapple does not.

2. The principal function of "player characters" as discrete collections of mechanical traits is to furnish each player with an assemblage of shiny things to show off to other players. Mechanical abstraction is well and good, but if you abstract away the act of curating one's collection of shinies, player engagement will suffer.

The way I've been articulating this is that good RPG design is about giving people cool things to say to each other. This lines up exactly with that. Great design also cuts out people saying boring things to each other. But that's a whole other level.

3. The GM, if present, is a fellow player. Ensure that they have their own toys and shinies to play with. The failure of a game to provide these is often a major contributor to why nobody wants to run it!

Yup, saying cool things and not saying boring things applies to the GM as well. A good game knows and cares about the GM's fun.

4. The most effective way of encouraging players to do what you want is to make a number go up. This applies to both to rewards and to misfortunes; a number counting up to disaster a much more visceral motivator than a number counting down to zero.

I think the proliferation of "ticking clock" mechanics is completely in line with the last point. From Girl by Moonlight's series track (where you try to fill your track before the darkness fills its track) to Apocalypse Keys, where this could apply to the doom clock or a character's ruin (when you reach max ruin, you become one of the baddies).

5. Crunch is good. The defining feature of tabletop roleplaying is that rules produce stories. The act of interpreting the outputs of the rules and the act of telling the game's story are the same activity. Be mindful of what kinds of stories your rules want to tell; you may find that their opinion on the matter differs from your own!

This connects back to "rules are toys" but what also comes to mind is C Thi Nguyen's book, Games: Agency As Art, which is a philosophical text that I haven't fully read. The core argument is that a game designer's medium is agency in the way a photographer's medium is light. Rules are the tools to shape agency in the same way a camera is a tool to play with light. Playing with agency leads to narratives, playing with light leads to images.

The last statement here is again a very striking one. I recently shared a video on the newsletter that made a similar point. All of a game's mechanisms affect the experience, which is another way of saying all the game's mechanisms create narrative. It's not a very long video, worth a watch.

6. Actually assembling your game's rules is as much a process of discovery as it is of invention. In the course of designing and playtesting, you may find that your own game has rules that you didn't know about. Where did they come from? It is a mystery.

Playtesting is one of the most complex parts of the game design process. It can be uplifting, frightening, vindicating, draining, delightful. My friend, Aaron Lim, is one of the great promoters of playtesting as first and foremost a kind of play. And while it can be fraught, one of the best things you can do for yourself as a designer is developing a positive relationship with the act of playtesting.

Aaron runs a playtest meetup called Playtest Zero (which I helped start and still attend). There are two sessions - one in SE Asia friendly time and one in a American / PST friendly time. It's open to anyone and happens over Discord. More info here.

7. Randomised outcomes should be made mandatory with care and restraint; randomised outcomes should be made available with delirious abandon. As far as is practicable, players should always have the option of asking the dice what unhinged bullshit should happen next. Corollary: lookup tables are your friend.

This is interesting. Randomizers (dice primarily) are one of the key pillars of RPG design. I'm not sure what exactly "made mandatory" means here because most modern design has rules about when to roll dice (and when to not).

I do think that sometimes a game positions the dice as an arbiter of what happens next. But giving the dice the power to ruin the fun isn't a good thing. The way I see it is that dice (or cards) are best used in a role where players can use them as collaborators. In some sense, this is what makes "mixed success" results important - they prompt you to add to the fiction but leave a wide space for what that addition could be.

8. Players don't need your permission to depart from the rules as written; granting it is arrogant. By the same token, however, it should never be unclear to players whether they're departing from the rules as written. Let the thought process behind what you're writing hang out for all the world to see; folks will be rummaging in the game's guts anyway, so give them easy access

I think arrogant is a strong word here but I understand it. I love the point about knowing when you're departing from a rule.

I was talking to someone recently that described game designers as "coy", writing rules but refusing to say why, as if finding out the intent of rules was a mystery to be discovered in play. And sure, there might be a place for that kind of emergent surprise. But like 99% of the time, its probably best to let people know why they're doing what they're doing.

9. If your game has a default setting, explain it as little as possible, but always let the rules and presentation reflect it. Seeing an entry for "poorly made dwarf" in a table of player character backgrounds will fire a group's imagination more strongly in three words than a chapter stuffed with worldbuilding lore could in ten thousand.

I'm a big fan of implied setting but it does interact with "don't be coy" in an interesting way. I'm a bigger fan of a facilitated, co-created setting. Love making the world with my friends at the table as we play.

But yes, paragraphs of lore are something that is a bad idea most of the time. It often just doesn't work. Assuming your goal is "communicate why and how this setting to people", paragraphs of lore might do the why but it almost always fails on the how. So much of lore books from the past ended with people going, "Cool, but like what do I do with this?"

10. You don't need to be good at naming things as long as you're good at puns. Wordplay, alliteration and rhyme may also serve in this capacity, as, in a pinch, may a well placed dick joke.

Lol.

I, I, I think I'm a gremlin game designer.

[lapisamethyst]

I'm not sure what exactly "made mandatory" means here

I feel like that’s just a caution to not go full FATAL over requiring your players to accept randomized results for every little detail.

[prokopetz]

In part, yes. More broadly, it's also an encouragement to think carefully about why you're rolling dice in any given situation; this set of principles may position crunchy rules as categorically good, but letting the rules decide what happens next is not necessarily synonymous with letting the dice decide what happens next. Don't neglect the other toys in your toybox!

[ezlo-x]

do you like/play any ttrpgs? i've always wanted to play in a homebrew zelda game!

i don't think I ever played ttrpgs so idk how a tloz game would work out in that genre </3

[schedulingisthefinalboss]

There's one out there called Reclaim The Wild. I haven't played it myself, but I have read through it and it seems quite good.

[schedulingisthefinalboss]

Thoughts on 10 Paces.

I played 10 Paces earlier this week with 2 of my friends. I GMed.

The main draw for me was its unique skill resolution system, it reminded me a lot of blackjack. Turns out that that mechanic is actually really fun! It took us a little while to get used to it, especially for me, because I both had to roll a random target number, and then decide myself how many rolls I think were appropriate for any given task (more rolls = easier / less urgent, and less rolls = more difficult, more urgent). However, we did get into the swing of things and I was pleasantly surprised by how such a light game (only 2 pages!) managed to generate some very tense situations.

For context, the game is western themed, and we improvised up a scenario about an alien invasion in some frontier town. Combat in this game is very good, a friend of mine has complained in the past that gunfights are very hit or miss in RPGs, that they could be more interesting than they usually are, and I do somewhat agree, luckily, 10 Paces does gunfights very well.

The combat in 10 Paces is all gunfights involving pistols, there are no rules for melee fighting or other types of guns (I did make some up on the spot, for fun and variety), but manages to still provide a very complex experience, trading in the positioning-oriented strategising that I've seen a lot, for a more probability calculating-oriented style. This does, however, result in the GM having to do a bunch of dice rolling and noting during combat that involves more than 1 NPC, but this was manageable by writing on a dry-erase mat.

The PDF for the rules is free to download on DriveThruRPG. I recommend giving it a look at least.