Stargazer's World » Open Game Table

Ask Your Readers: Christmas Gifts for Roleplayers

Stargazer — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 10:08:44 +0000

Christmas is approaching quite fast and people all around the globe are getting ready to purchase gifts for their loved ones. Roleplayers are usually no exception here and quite a few of them plan to get RPG-related gifts for their friends and family. I am sure we all have some friend or relative who has some interest in RPGs but hasn’t started playing yet. What would be a great gift for someone like this? And we all know the one guy who has everything! Are there any obscure and/or rare roleplaying products even that guy doesn’t own yet? Please post your recommendations below!

When I am ask what I would to give to my roleplaying friends as a present, there are a couple of things that come to mind:

Eureka
Eureka is one of the coolest products I had the honor to review this year. It’s the perfect gift for any GM and it’s not some weird novelty but something you can really put to use all the time. Let me quoute from the review I wrote in August:

So why should any GM get Eureka? In my humble opinion it’s the most useful tool a gamemaster could probably have. We all know that sometimes coming up with a unique adventure can be very hard. Especially when you get older and you don’t have that much time to prepare your games, you’re happy for any help you can get. I am pretty sure I could open Eureka at any page, read the adventure plot I find there and run an adventure after only 15 minutes of prep, probably less. That’s the power of this book, and that’s why I wholeheartedly recommend it.

You can get Eureka from your local brick & mortar store, the Engine Publishing online shop or from DriveThruRPG, if you prefer the PDF version. Regardless where you buy it, it’s an awesome product and a great gift for any GM.

Open Game Table Vol. 1 and 2
The Open Game Table is one of the greatest projects I had part it. The two books currently available contain the best articles from the RPG blogosphere and are perfect gifts for anyone interested in RPGs. The 1st volume is a bit D&D-centric, but still has a lot of high-quality content even if you are not into that game. Let me quote from my friend Roberto’s (aka Sunglar) review of OGT Vol. 2 and my preview of OGT Vol. 1. Let’s start with Sunglar’s review of OGT Vol. 2:

I could muse on and on about more pots, probably about the whole book, but let me summarize it by saying this. The idea of collecting a selection of outstanding blog posts must be commended and applauded; it is a great opportunity to share ideas with gamers out there who might have missed them. If you have a friend who loves gaming, but may not be as active in the online community, this will make an excellent gift. If you are a gamer and just don’t have time to follow every blog (and who does), this is an excellent book to get. Even is you are a blogger and follow many of this talented authors, do yourself a favor and pick a copy, it is a different experience readying all these posts together, playing off each other and creating a greater whole out of the awesomeness of its parts.

And that’s what I had to say about OGT Vol. 1:

You don’t get articles written by detached game designers sitting in some emerald tower but every article was written by one of us, a roleplaying game fan, who writes about his hobby on the internet. So you probably ask yourself why you should buy the book when you can read the posts on the ‘net for free. In my opinion there are several reasons: you get a beautiful book that you can read while commuting, sitting in your garden or wherever you like without the need of a computer or internet access, the anthology also contains only the very best RPG blog articles of 2008 and it is organized in a clear and sensible manner. You’ll probably find many awesome articles you’ve missed on the ‘net, mainly because trying to follow everything that has been written on the network is like drinking from the proverbial firehose.

Both books shouldn’t be missing in any gamers’ library and are the perfect gift for anyone interested in gaming! You can get them from Lulu, Amazon.com and many other places. You can also get both the Open Game Table Vol.1 and Vol.2 as PDF documents at DriveThruRPG. There’s also a bundle deal that gets you both volumes for mere $17.

Last but not least there’s Savage Worlds, undoubtedly one of my favorite roleplaying game systems. It’s pretty inexpenisve, can be used with almost any setting and easy to learn and play. In my humble opinion every roleplayer worth his salt should at least own one copy of the Savage Worlds Explorer’s Edition. Here’s an excerpt from a review I wrote ages ago:

If you are looking for a complex ruleset that has rules for every situation then SWEE is probably not the right choice for you. Check out GURPS instead. But if you need a simple and fast roleplaying rules system that can easily work with any setting, than SWEE is worth more than a look. The rules are very easy to learn and the edges and hindrances give players a lot of opportunities for creating unique characters. Another major selling point is the low price and the compact format. SWEE could be perfect when going to a roleplaying convention. Just throw the rules, some character sheets, a pencil, your dice and a deck of poker cards into your backpack and you’re good to go. If I should rate SWEE on a scale from 1 to 5, I would give it a 5.

The print edition should be available in your favorite brick and mortar store or your favorite online shop. The PDF version sets you back $9.99 and is available at DriveThruRPG.

These are my gaming gift recommendations for this year’s holiday season. But as the post’s title suggests I am also interested in your thoughts on that subject. Please share your gaming gift recommendations below! Any comment is highly appreciated!

Come blog at my table… A review of the Open Game Table Anthology volume 2!

Sunglar — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 10:00:45 +0000

As a relative newcomer to blogging (only since February) I can’t say I kept abreast of the blogosphere. Of course I read some blogs but it was not a conscious effort, but since I’ve begun my wonderful foray into this community I’ve discovered great blogs, exciting ideas and made some wonderful friends. I’ve tried to catch up and read some of the blogs out there but this is a titanic endeavor. If only someone had selected the cream of the crop of blog posts out there and placed then in one place where I could read them…

Oh wait, someone has! There are two volumes out there that do just this. Open Game Table, the Anthology of Roleplaying Game Blogs. I received volume 2 as a review copy and have been enjoying it over the last few weeks. I had mentioned my intention of writing a review to my fellow bloggers but it took me a little longer than expected because I read through the whole thing! I found myself enraptured by the thoughts and ideas in the collection, some I agreed with, others I outright disagreed with but that was what made it so exciting, it got me thinking.

Editor Jonathan Jacobs and his team of collaborators, editors, authors and artists, made a wonderful job of putting together a well balanced mix of topical themes and ideas useful to both game masters and players. As I am almost exclusively a game master, I found the section on Campaign Success and Failure particularly enlightening. Two pieces on Monotheism in fantasy religions and D&D in particular caught my attention on the Campaign Design Choices group (one by Mr. Michael Wolf himself, kudos!). My current campaign deals with a monotheistic religion in a world with a D&D style pantheon and both pieces gave me new aspects to consider and ideas to include in my game.

A post I HAD read before encountering in the anthology was one from Gnome Stew, The Decamer Campaign; it proposes the idea of building a campaign around the ten “silliest” D&D monsters. I had read it and loved the idea but amidst all the things going on I had forgotten about it. Finding it again was like running into an old friend.

I could muse on and on about more pots, probably about the whole book, but let me summarize it by saying this. The idea of collecting a selection of outstanding blog posts must be commended and applauded; it is a great opportunity to share ideas with gamers out there who might have missed them. If you have a friend who loves gaming, but may not be as active in the online community, this will make an excellent gift. If you are a gamer and just don’t have time to follow every blog (and who does), this is an excellent book to get. Even is you are a blogger and follow many of this talented authors, do yourself a favor and pick a copy, it is a different experience readying all these posts together, playing off each other and creating a greater whole out of the awesomeness of its parts.

I guess the only thing I regret is that I didn’t read all this blogs when they first came out. I would have sure loved to leave my opinion. Well it may actually be a good thing, I do need to work and have a family life. Now to get volume one and wait for volume three!

Open Game Table now available at Sphärenmeisters Spiele

Stargazer — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 07:30:23 +0000

This will probably interest my German readers: The Open Game Table Vol. 1 is now available for 19.95€ at Sphärenmeisters Spiele, my favorite online game shop.

According to fellow blogger Moritz Mehlem, Roland Bahr, the owner of Sphärenmeisters Spiele told him that he will offer the second volume, too, as soon as it’s available.

If you are living in Germany you definitely should check out this online game store. Prices are always fair and often orders are shipped on the same day. Roland usually has even the most obscure games in stock and he even answers questions via ICQ. This is a level of service that you don’t see often these days!

OGT Sponsorships

Stargazer — Tue, 25 May 2010 06:41:38 +0000

Jonathan Jacobs and his team of editors is currently hard working on the second volume of the Open Game Table. When Vol. 1 came out each and every contributor was provided with a free copy of the book. Last year Jonathan sent out over 70 copies to contributors and reviewers and I think it took him quite some time to get even again.

This time he’s not able to raise all the money needed on his own, so he has started a fundraising project to pay for the money needed to print and ship the contributors’ copies. If you want to help Jonathan with this you can become a sponsor and support the OGT Vol. 2 by donating.

Sponsorships are ranked in levels from Community Sponsor to Legendary Sponsors and starting with Heroic Sponsorship, you can have your blog or company’s logo included on the back cover of the book. For more details on the sponsorship levels check out this chart:

For more details on the Open Game Table and the sponsorship, check out Jonathan’s blog “The Core Mechanic”. In my opinion this is a project worthy of your attention (and your donations)!

Posts from Stargazer’s World will be included in OGT2

Stargazer — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 13:40:39 +0000

I have known this for some time now, but I wanted to wait with this announcement, to give Jonathan Jacobs the chance to post it first: Several of my articles written for Stargazer’s World and one guest post I wrote for Philippe Ménard’s “Musings of the ChattyDM” (now part of Critical Hits) have been selected for the upcoming Open Game Table Vol. 2! I want to sincerly thank my readers, the peer reviewers and editorial board for considering my works as interesting and relevant enough to be included into the Open Game Table. And I can’t wait to get my hands on the final book.

For more information on the first volume of OGT and the upcoming Vol. 2, check out Jonathan’s blog “The Core Mechanic”. There’s also a complete list of all participating blogs. Congratulations to all bloggers who made it into that list. It’s an honor to be among such formidable folks!

Open Game Table Vol. 2: Nominations!

Stargazer — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 10:55:37 +0000

On Saturday Jonathan Jacobs posted the list of nominations for Open Game Table Vol. 2 on his blog “The Core Mechanic” and it seems a few of my posts made the list, too. Yay me!
There were 135 nominations for Volume 1 but this time, 375 blog posts have been nominated. I fear the reviewers will have a lot to do this year.

And I agree with Jonathan when he considers this a massive success. The high number of nominations shows that the interest in a RPG blog anthology is even higher than last year. Perhaps we can even start dreaming about a Volume 3.
In my humble opinion, there are quite a few talented people out there in the RPG blogosphere and I am pretty sure Volume 2 of the OGT will be as good as Volume 1 if not better. Although I try to follow a lot of RPG blogs I always seem to miss a few of the true gems out there. But I am confident, that I’ll find a few of those great articles in the upcoming OGT. And while we are waiting for the reviewers to do their job, why not read a few of the articles that made it last year? If you haven’t done so already, you should really buy a copy of OGT Vol. 1 at Lulu. And if you already own a copy, why not give a copy away as a gift?

I am very happy that Jonathan decided to go ahead and create OGT Vol.2. By the way, if you have never heard of the Open Game Table before, check out this post to read about how it all started. And while you are at it, check out my favorite article from Volume 1: Berin Kinsman’s “Get Your Dice Off My Lawn!”

Open Game Table Vol. 2 is coming!

Stargazer — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 10:07:32 +0000

Wahoo! This is great news! Jonathan Jacobs has decided that he wants to go forward with OGT Vol. 2 for Summer 2010. This time, the OGT will be released simultaneously as an ebook and retail print version via Studio2Publishing.

But of course he still needs a) a peer review panel and b) nominations for blog posts. If you want to sign up for the peer review panel, you can submit your information here. In the case, you want to nominate worthy blog posts, you can submit up to 5 URLs at a time here.

I would be more than honored if anyone would nominate some of my posts. Since the nomination phase for OGT Vol. 1 I have written quite a few popular posts, and it would be great if another of my posts found their way into the second volume as well. Thanks in advance! And if this isn’t a good time to dig the archives of you favorite RPG blogs, I don’t know what is.

On a related note, Jonathan has decided to start blogging again, so head over to his blog “The Core Mechanic” and check out his latest posts!

Get the Open Game Table for $4.99 until November 30th

Stargazer — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 05:58:44 +0000

Jonathan Jacobs has reduced the price of the PDF version of the Open Game Table: The Anthology of Roleplaying Game Blogs, Vol. 1 to just $4.99 until the end of the month! If you don’t own a copy, yet, this is your chance!

And if you don’t know what the OGT is about check out the product information from Amazon.com:

Open Game Table is aimed at bridging the gap between the RPG blogging community and the broader table-top gaming fan base by showcasing the best talent the community has to offer. Within these pages are 47 blog posts from 32 top-quality RPG blogs, plus a Foreword written by RPG luminary Wolfgang Baur.

Packed with juicy content and over 60 illustrations, this book is Pure Gold. The book chapters include:

1 – Play Style;
2 – Game Play;
3 – Characters & Players;
4 – Monsters & NPCs;
5 – Encounters, Settings, and Locations;
6 – Adventure Design;
7 – Campaign Setting Design;
8 – Classes, Action, and Equipment;
9 – RPG History & Commentary; and
10 – The RPG Toolbox.

This anthology is the result of the hard work of nearly 100 volunteers, authors, editors, judges, artists, and designers. A true grass roots effort; it is a tour de force of the RPG blogging universe.

This book contains the articles of many members of the RPG Bloggers Network including my very own post about Firearms in D&D 4th Edition. If you are still unsure, if you want to buy it, check out what WIRED Magazine wrote about the OGT:

The Open Game Table Anthology is a treasure trove. A tome worth slaying a few orcs for. Because it had such a diverse range of material to choose from it has been able to collate not just quality writing and ideas, but a real breadth of discussion that you don’t get as often as you would like in role playing materials. There are chapters for GMs and DMs on Play Stlyle, Monsters and NPCs and Campaign Setting Design. There are articles for players such as "Advice On Being A Good Player". My favorite chapter was Chapter 9 which details some great historical moments and commentary on how RPGs have become what they are today. Open Game Table has two clear strengths: content and content. The quality of the content and the breadth of the content make this anthology worth the money. The amount of ideas for GMs on how to handle player conflict, managing scenes, improving your role playing are well chosen and topical. In many ways, this book is like a continuous improvement handbook for RPG groups across the globe. It has ideas and tips throughout each article that can help you create better games and engage better as an RPG Group and ultimately have more fun – which is what it is all about, really. Braunstein I personally would buy the whole book for just the section on RPG History. The article that describes a young Dave Arneson taking all before him in "Braunstein" – the world’s first ever role playing game – is delightful. The passion with which the author, Ben Robbins encourages us all to talk to those who were at the beginning of it all, and to capture and learn from that history is what an anthology like this is all about…

Check out the full review here.

To get your discount, please use this link: http://is.gd/548Ox

Open Game Table now available as PDF

Stargazer — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 07:05:45 +0000

Yesterday Jonathan Jacobs, editor of “Open Game Table: The Anthology of Roleplaying Game Blogs, Vol. 1”, and co-founder of Nevermet Press has let us know that the OGT is now finally available as PDF on Lulu (RPGNow will follow). So, if you haven’t ordered a copy yet, because you were waiting for a digital version, now is your chance.

The OGT is a compilation of the best roleplaying game blog articles of 2008 and if you ask me, every gamer should have at least one copy on his or her bookshelf! If you want to learn more about the OGT, why not check out my review?

UPDATE: It’s now available on RPGNow, too!

OGT available at Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.de

Stargazer — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 10:58:56 +0000

This morning I noticed that the “Open Game Table” is finally available at Amazon.de and Amazon.co.uk! This is good news for us Europeans, since shipping from the US not only takes ages but also can be pretty expensive.
I’ve also posted my review I wrote for the Amazon.com product page on both sites as well. Perhaps this helps to increase the sales and we’ll see an OGT Volume 2 after all. :)

If you have no idea what the OGT actually is, check out my review.

OGT will finally go retail!

Stargazer — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 13:50:54 +0000

Good news, everyone! Jonathan Jacobs officially announced today that he entered a contract with Studio 2 Publishing:

I am very pleased to announce that as of today, I have entered into a contract with Studio 2 Publishing for the exclusive retail distribution of Open Game Table: The Anthology of Roleplaying Game Blogs (Vol. 1). S2P currently publishes and distributes games such as Savage Worlds, Deadlands, The Edge of Mignight, and many many more. It’s very likely you already have many games they distribute on your game shelf. [...]

That’s really great news! The Open Game Table will finally be available at retail stores all over the US (and hopefully sometimes even in the rest of the world)!

By the way, it will probably take a few more months until you can get a copy of the OGT at your local shop, so why don’t you order a copy from Amazon.com or Lulu in the meantime?

Get your copy of OGT now!

Stargazer — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 08:23:34 +0000

The Open Game Table is finally available from Amazon and Lulu for just $22.95! It will also be available from Indie Press Revolutions soon. The 140-page book is as Jonathan Jacobs, editor in chief, put it, “a true grass roots effort; it is a tour de force of the RPG blogging universe”!

So, what are you waiting for? Head over to Amazon or Lulu and get your copy now!
UPDATE: The review @ WIRED Geekdad is now online. Check it out!

Quick reminder: OPEN GAME TABLE available for preorder at amazon.com

Stargazer — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 05:51:40 +0000

I just wanted to remind everyone that the upcoming “OPEN GAME TABLE: The Anthology of Roleplaying Game Blogs, Volume 1” is now available at amazon.com for preorder. The 140-pages book will also be available in local stores and at Lulu.com as well.
The official release date is March 23rd, which is next monday!

Preview: “Open Game Table, The Anthology of Roleplaying Game Blogs”

Stargazer — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 09:30:02 +0000

If you haven’t been living under a rock for the last few months you have probably read about the upcoming “Open Game Table, The Anthology of Roleplaying Game Blogs“. The 140-page book will be available on Lulu, Amazon, Indie Press Revolution and local dealers for only $22.95 on March 23rd, 2009. And if you ask me, it will be worth every penny.

As one of the contributing authors I was provided with a PDF of the final draft (only cover and foreword were missing). And so I had the chance to have a look at the book weeks before the actual release. So, let’s now have a look at the content:

The book consists of ten chapters: Play Style, Game Play, Characters & Players, Monsters & NPCs, Encounters, Settings & Location, Adventure Design, Campaign Setting Design, Classes, Action and Equipment, RPG History & Commentary and The RPG Toolbox. I won’t go into much detail here (I don’t want to spoil anything) but suffice to say that each chapter contains a couple of excellent articles from blogs all around the RPG Bloggers Network.

And that’s probably one of the great things about this book. You don’t get articles written by detached game designers sitting in some emerald tower but every article was written by one of us, a roleplaying game fan, who writes about his hobby on the internet. So you probably ask yourself why you should buy the book when you can read the posts on the ‘net for free. In my opinion there are several reasons: you get a beautiful book that you can read while commuting, sitting in your garden or wherever you like without the need of a computer or internet access, the anthology also contains only the very best RPG blog articles of 2008 and it is organized in a clear and sensible manner. You’ll probably find many awesome articles you’ve missed on the ‘net, mainly because trying to follow everything that has been written on the network is like drinking from the proverbial firehose.

I especially want to congratulate Jonathan Jacobs on how he has managed to transfer blog posts into print form. A feat that is probably much harder than you believe. Each post is properly credited and a link to the author’s blog and the relevant post is provided with each article in the book. Referenced URLs are listed in footnotes if necessary.

The book also contains quite a lot of artwork, something that I didn’t expect before. Most of the images used in the anthology have an old-school feel to them (especially the cartoon-style drawings) but that’s not a bad thing. The illustration in the book are black and white, but if you expect the RPG blog anthology to be a full-color book with artwork on par with WotC’s recent releases you will be probably disappointed. But in my opinion the artwork is top-notch and it never seems misplaced or out of context.

All in all I am very excited about the whole project and I can’t wait to get my print copy of “Open Game Table”! And I really hope that it’s just the first book out of many that will bring the wonders of RPG blogs to the unenlightened masses … or so to speak. And perhaps it will help to spread the word about the quality content you can find in RPG blogs these days.
And perhaps we’ll finally get a proper blog category for the ENnies 2010! *shakes fist at the organizers of the ENnie Award*

RPG Anthology, blog comments and Creative Commons

Stargazer — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 09:52:11 +0000

With the upcoming RPG Blog Anthology some discussion about copyright and other legal issues on the RPG Bloggers Network was inevitable. Perhaps you already have read the posts on The Bonemaster and The Core Mechanic.

Jonathan from The Core Mechanic included comments from the original posts into the first draft of the RPG Blog Anthology. That is not uncommon for this kind of publication and it was his impression that comments are considered part of the blog post and that the comment’s author has already given the blog author the right to share, modify and republish the post. Others are not so sure and added some “Terms of Service” to their site to make sure they don’t have to ask the permission of the blog’s author when they want to use the comment in future publications.

And perhaps you’ve noticed that I decided to release the content of this blog under a Creative Commons license. Then it struck me! I already have a binding contract with Jonathan in which I gave him a non-exclusive license to publish one of my blog posts in the upcoming RPG Blog Anthology. Does he have to release the anthology under the CC now, too? Or have I broken my agreement with him? At first I was a bit worried, but then I noticed a small word that at once solves everything: non-exclusive. The CC license is non-exclusive, so as the owner of my content I am still allowed to enter any other non-exclusive agreements.

But back to the comments issue. From what I know the US law regarding copyright etc. has already been adapted to the internet age. That’s not the case in many other countries like Germany, where I live. That makes things a bit more difficult. But even without a TOS we can take some things for granted:

the comments are owned by their respective authors
the comment’s author already gave you a world-wide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, modify, adapt and publish the comment solely for the purpose of displaying on your blog

I thought about adding some legal mumbo-jumbo in addition to the CC license already there, but I decided against it. When I want to use a comment in something like the RPG Blog Anthology I will just ask nicely for the author’s permission. And if I don’t get it or I can’t contact him or her? Then I am obviously out of luck and live will go on…

RPG Blog Anthology

Stargazer — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 09:14:12 +0000

When I was sitting in front of my computer this morning, drinking a cup of hot coffee, one email by Jonathan Jacobs grabbed my attention. He’s currently working hard to get the RPG Blog Anthology released and he sent me a draft of chapter eight which includes one of my posts.

And from what I’ve seen so far, the RPG Blog Anthology will be a must for players and GMs alike. The quality of the writing is excellent and the featured artwork is very nice, too. You can check out a few pieces of artwork in Johnathan’s latest update on the upcoming anthology.

The transition from online blog posts to printed publication seems to work out pretty well. Links are converted to footnotes at the end of the articles and they even added some comments from the original posts. The current layout is a simple two-column-layout and the fonts are easy to read, which is pretty nice in my book. It’s all about the content after all. And you’ll get a lot of that. Chapter 8, which is about D&D 4th Edition Classes, Equipment and Action Points is 30 pages long!

If you want to support the RPG Blog Anthology you can a) still donate money to the project (there’s a PayPal donate button at Johnathan’s blog) or b) help spread the word. If you are on good terms with your local gaming store, you can perhaps convince them to put some copies on the shelves when the anthology is finally out.

For more information on the RPG Blog Anthology please check out Jonathan Jacobs’ blog “The Core Mechanic“!