A Role Playing Games Blog
Random musings
Gen Con 2011, a retrospective… Part 3: On to other stuff…
0August 22, 2011
So we’ve covered role-playing games (and I missed a couple of things but I’ll get to that in my next post), other games and minis, but there is so much more to do at Gen Con. One of the things I wanted to get where t-shirts. My last time around I stocked up and while most were worn to tatters, but a couple lasted through the years… So getting new shirts was high on my to-get list. Unlike some games that were impulse buys with t-shirts I took the time to shop around see what was available and I brought the ones I wanted on the last day.
The Off World Designs booth had the official Gen Con t-shirt for sale so I stopped there and got two for friends (including the esteemed creator of this blog to whom I am yet to ship his shirt, shame on me!) and while there I picked up their Boba Fettish t-shirt for a friend. While I love their designs, and just browse their webpage to see some great ideas, in my circles they are probably the best known geek shirts purveyors, so I get to see their shirts on friends… I wanted something different!
Get 20% off until September 20 on selected DriveThruRPG titles
0August 22, 2011
As in the months before DriveThruRPG has provided us with a coupon code that gives you 20% off of the following products:
The coupon code you need to use at checkout to get the 20% discount is AfterGenConGlow2011.
By the way, if you haven’t checked out Iron Dynasty yet, you definitely should do so. It’s an awesome and very original setting for Savage Worlds that combines elements from feudal Japan with steampunk. You can read my review of this game here.
D&D is rubbish! Or is it?
9August 22, 2011
EN World’s Morrus shared three videos created by Nikolas Lloyd three days ago. In these three videos its creator explains why he thinks early D&D was rubbish, why mid-period D&D wasn’t great and why fourth edition D&D is terrible. In my opinion he has a few good points and even if you disagree with him, they are fun to watch.
Ask the Readers: One campaign, several GMs
9August 19, 2011
Regularly I hear or read about campaigns in which the gamemaster is not a permanent position held by just one person, but everyone from the group takes on the GM’s mantle from time to time. For a lot of people that even seems to be the traditional way to do it.
Since I started playing pen & paper roleplaying games in the early ‘90s I’ve participated in a lot of campaigns. And usually a campaign has one dedicated GM and when another person wants to run a game we then switch to a new campaign. I don’t think it has happened that often that someone took over another GM’s campaign. For some reason it just doesn’t feel right to mess with other people’s worlds.
As regular readers of this blog you will probably have noticed that I have been reading a lot of narrativist games recently. What a lot of this games have in common is that the players usually have much more influence on the world and how the story evolves than in more traditional games, like D&D for example. The gamemaster has to give up a good amount of control already, so why am I bothered by the idea of several GMs in charge of a single campaign.
One thing I am definitely not too fond of are gamemaster characters. I am talking about those special NPCs of a GM that are run as if they were player characters. More often than not these NPCs steal the show from the players and ruin the game for everyone. When someone who is not the regular GM takes over, their player character may become such a special NPC.
So, what are you thoughts on this subject? Is it ok for you when several people share the position of the GM from time to time. Or is this something you avoid like the plague? Please let your voices be heard in the comments below!
From Weird West to Barbarians of the Future
3August 17, 2011
Today I want to share a couple of things I stumbled upon during the last days.
-
Tomb of the Overfiend
Weird West is definitely one of coolest old-school games ever conceived. It’s extremely rules-light, but contains a lot of weird west goodness. Recently Stuart Robertson, creator of that fine game, released a free one-page adventure based on an excellent map by Matt Jackson. And even if you’re not into Weird West you can easily use it for other old-school games as well. - Ashen Stars Theme Music
James Semple who has done several soundtracks for Gumshoe games in the past, has composed a theme music for Robin D. Laws latest game, Ashen Stars. I really hope this is the first sign of a full Ashen Stars soundtrack to come. You can listen to the rather short theme tune here. -
Barbarians of the Future
You probably might already have heard about Barbarians of Lemuria, Simon Washbourne’s Sword & Sorcery RPG. While I haven’t tried the game yet, it’s among the games I have to give a try at least once. Some people actually call it one of the best RPGs of the genre. Obviously the system used in BoL can also be easily be used in other genres. There’s Jabberwocky Productions’ post-apocalyptic setting-expansion Barbarians of the Aftermath for example.
A while back rpg.net forum member Maxwell Luther created a free PDF supplement for BoA that allows players and the GM to experience adventures in the grim-dark future of the Warhammer 40,000 universe (with the serial numbers filed off). If you are interested in both BoA and the WH40K universe, you should definitely give it a look. You can download the 42-paged PDF here. -
Expedition RPG
Fellow RPG blogger Dennis N. Santana has recently released an early playtest edition of his Expedition RPG. I haven’t had time to give it a closer look, but according to Shaun Welch’s playtest reports (part one & part two), he and his players not only had fun with the fast character creation system that allows truly unique character concepts, but also very much enjoyed the combat rules. From what I’ve seen Expedition contains a lot of interesting ideas that set the game apart from the majority of fantasy games. If you’re looking for something new, why don’t you give it a try. It’s free and obviously pretty polished for a game still in its alpha stage.
Gen Con 2011, a retrospective… Part 2: Other games and minis too!
0August 16, 2011
And we are back… Welcome to part 2 of my Gen Con retrospective. When we left our brave traveler he was in the midst of the four best days in gaming, Gen Con! Ok let’s get back to business.
I am primarily a role-player, while I dabble in the occasional board game and played some CCGs back in the day, there is nothing I would rather do that chuck dice and tell a story among friends. So you can imagine role-playing games were my primary draw at Gen Con. I did not even visit the wargaming and board games area until Saturday. I did not see the card games at all (sorry CCG fans). However I did see some very interesting games of the strictly non-rpg variety in the exhibit hall and got to demo a couple of them.
Fantasy Flight Games was there, talk about beautiful games. The number of FFG bags around the convention was outstanding. I was particularly impressed by their Dust Tactics demos. I just watched but the miniatures and terrain that drew me in seemed to be part of a fun game that made me want to play.
Converting the Spouse: An Ongoing Quest – Part 3
2August 15, 2011
When last we left our valiant adventurers, they had climbed Mt. Doom and were about to toss the Ring into the giant Volcano… wait… think that is a different story. Ah yes! Now I remember, last time, in the Quest to Turn My Wife into a Roleplayer we had finished character creation and I pondered what kind of game we were actually going to be playing. I decided that I wanted to start up the game before my wife forgot what kind of character she was actually playing (in case you may have forgotten, she is a Hare Clan Smith trained by the Oriole Clan; interest include money, sweets, men, and she is afraid of bugs).
I only did some very light prep for the session, most of which actually entailed me writing out her character sheet in very big color-coded numbers so that she would be able to quickly remember where the numbers she needed were. I didn’t include stuff like Wounds on the sheet, since that probably wasn’t really going to be an issue. In fact, the sheet really became a very boiled down version of the game, primarily limited to just Rings, Traits, and Skills accompanied by Advantages, Disadvantages, and School related benefits. I also just jotted down for her the damage on her Katana and her armor (just in case I decided to endanger her life).
(more…)
You have a question about an existing or upcoming Stargazer Games product? Ask away! You want to know what we think about a recent development in the RPG industry? Send in your questions. You always wanted to know what we think about game X? Send us an email.
