I've been playing the original Star Wars RPG (WEG 1987) in a solo game and damn if combat isn't cumbersome. Lots of rolling and comparison and adding numbers up, as trad games like this commonly require. Photo by Zacharias Korsalka on Pexels.com First, you roll your skill (e.g. "Blaster") to attack against a target number … Continue reading Cumbersome Star Wars Combat
Lots of discussion happening today around games that are missing rules or worlds. That's a bit simplified, so here are the posts I'm thinking about: Negative Space"F**k-You" Design As a note to the latter: I don't really love the way the author implies such a strong sense of emotional negativity, but this does resonate with … Continue reading Be specific about unwritten rules
I've been thinking about trying to do for Star Wars d6 what Cthulhu Dark did for Call of Cthulhu, or what Into the Odd did for Cypher: break it down to a minimal approach without needing to spend too much time thinking about game rules. As I was looking at this, I started to wonder if it doesn't need anything more than GM attitude. Here’s my first set of thoughts about the game.
Photo by Christopher Burns on Unsplash The podcast "Fear of a Black Dragon" does the thing that yields my highest praise in gaming media: it makes me want to stop listening and go play a game! The episode on "Times That Fry Men's Souls" is especially good, in large part due to the deep discussion … Continue reading Implied setting
NB: Stream of consciousness style. Just throwing this down someplace. "Broken Concentration" by Clint Cearley I really need to end my Wednesday game because weeknights are just too difficult. I've already cancelled my Tuesday and Thursday games, and I haven't done Monday in a long time. Already, this Wednesday and next have no game because … Continue reading Spring 2019 Campaign Musings
Originally, I wrote this post to talk about all the things I dislike about the changes to the Adventurers League rule set. Most of it comes down to treasure. Magic item counts in the previous rules had their problems, but folks could understand; now you need a cheat sheet just to understand what you get. … Continue reading Outgrowing Adventurers League
A recent (private) thread from +Stacy Dellorfano and an ensuing comment from +Kiel Chenier got me thinking about what I like about these older, simpler rulesets. Bottom line up front: it's the "simpler", not the "older". Part of the appeal to some gamers of the "Old School Renaissance" is nostalgia. This is how they played when … Continue reading Open Source Roleplaying
When I was a kid, seeing a movie meant more than just a couple of hours of entertainment. It meant hours or maybe days of material for playing "make-believe" or "pretend". After The Goonies or Return of the Jedi or anything else I liked, the ideas and characters and settings and themes would inform my … Continue reading Rooted in make-believe
Technoskald's Forge 