Gaming and Escapism
Outsyder Gaming went on hiatus a few weeks ago because I was devoting all of my time to my wife's health and had no time or energy to write. Sadly, she passed away on March 23rd. She is better now (no TTP, no pain, no Gv[...]Read on >>
Core Rules Regarding Shields
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System for Player Narrative Control
March 31, 2009 from Mediocre Tales of the Fair to Middling Game Master
Filed under: Advice/Tools, Game Design, RPG Hub
I recently set out on a quest to run a player narrative game. (You can read about it here and here.) While I have yet to actually sit down and run one, I am coming awfully close. It seems that every time I get the [...] Filed under: Advice/Tools, Game Design, RPG Hub
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A Pocketful of Whimsy
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ODD Solo Game with my wife – Update
We're parents who are also raising our grand-daughter. So what do we do when we have a childless 24-36 hours? We play Damp;D! That's just how we roll. [Insert laugh-track here]br /br /My wife also has left some thoughts [...]Read on >>
What if 4E was open?
This is part of my RPG series of entries here at SOB. See the inaugural entry in the series for more details. Chris, over at 6D6 Fireball, has a recent piece called What if 4e was free? In it, he floats the idea of bui[...]Read on >>
Video Goodies: Don’t Bring Your DM on a Blind Date
Funny Videos | Funny Cartoons | More Video Clips Related posts:Recluses, Role-Players, and the Hopelessly Desperate: A Video About Online Dating Thanks, BoingBoing. You always find the best stuff! This v[...]Read on >>
Now Fortified with Retro Sci-Fi!
If you have enough Geek EXP, you know who these extraterrestrial dames are, and which shows they starred in. Would this not be the superior space cantina? [...]Read on >>
Henchman System
One idea I had lately as I pondered the DMPC (which I use a lot mostly to provide constant interaction between the players and something not hostile, even if they’re in the middle of nowhere) was the idea of making[...]Read on >>
Playlist Fun
I ran the second session of my Wilderlands game last week. It took us about a month to arrange that follow-up meeting due to everyone's busy-ass schedules, but I think we've found an arrangement that should work. It invo[...]Read on >>
Skill Resolution
I've had a though inspired by Rob Kuntz over at Lord of the Green Dragons and the indomitable James Maliszewski at Grognardia.One of the benefits of a well run old school game is that it requires more active effort on th[...]Read on >>
Confessions of a Lazy GM
I have a confession to make. I’m a Lazy GM. But y’know what? That’s ok. It’s ok because I’ve worked hard at my laziness, refining and mastering numerous techniques to finally reach this leve[...]Read on >>
UK DD Newsletter From WotC
Wizards is offering a new online newsletter to UK fans of D&D. If you introduce friends to the newsletter, they’ll also send you a free T-shirt and possibly other stuff. (source) [...]Read on >>
Star Wars Primetime Adventures Praise
While reading through Twitter this afternoon, I caught an exchange dealing with Primetime Adventures. One guy mentioned our Star Wars PTA game podcasted through Canon Puncture and I chimed in with a thanks. He had this t[...]Read on >>
New Project: Fantasy Wild West Supplement for SW
I stumbled across a href="http://microlite20.net/node/94" target="_top"Gunsmoke amp; Goblins/a for Microlite20 last week. It's been out since last August and I'm not sure how I missed it. It's fantasy wild west setting f[...]Read on >>
New Editions and Old Fans
March 31, 2009 from Dungeon Mastering 101
Filed under: 4e, Champions, HERO, RPG, RPG Hub, roleplaying
The announcement of the upcoming 6th Edition of the Hero System got me to thinking about the process that goes into conceiving and producing a new edition of a game system (especially a well-established and popular one)[...] Filed under: 4e, Champions, HERO, RPG, RPG Hub, roleplaying
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Good Shops: Game Parlor – Woodbridge, Va.
It is brutally hard to run a good game shop, most are fair to poor, but the Game Parlor guys manage to run two of them in Northern Virginia. The Woodbridge shop is the farthest from me but it is a pretty straight shot do[...]Read on >>
The Dungeon Reality Show: Half-Time Showdown, Part 2
First Down, 5 Kobolds to go Okay so after having, for all intents and purposes, killed the game by the time that 8h PM rolled by, I asked all three players if they’d be willing to play the original 2nd scene of the[...]Read on >>
Overheard last weekend at my FLGS
Last weekend I spent a good chunk of time sitting on a stool at Games Plus playing in Chgowiz's Dark Ages campaign. When my thief character wasn't fighting goblins and pillaging ancient libraries, I listened in on anothe[...]Read on >>
Monster Summoning VII
a href="http://webamused.com/bumblers/?p=985"One of the blogs I read fairly often/a mentioned a a href="http://jrients.blogspot.com/2009/03/two-neat-bits-from-supplement-i.html"post on different blog/a that said:br /bloc[...]Read on >>
Races At War: Halfling
span style="font-style:italic;"This is my contribution to a href="http://bookofrev.blogspot.com/2009/03/rpg-blog-carnival-war.html"this month's blog carnival on War/a hosted by a href="http://bookofrev.blogspot.com/searc[...]Read on >>
Inq. of the Week: PHB2 Power Creep
In the heyday of 3.5 I’d browse every new splat book, not for intriguing new play options (many, many sucked), but for the overpowered Prestige Class de jour. After all, who didn’t want to dip into a single level of [...]Read on >>
Aspects for F#FF
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Item Seed: Straight Razor
Who needs a dagger with this thing? Reaching up to 8 inches long, these can be wicked nasty weapons in their own right and who would ever see it coming? Add a random magic ability like protection from fire or a boost to [...]Read on >>
Converting 3.0/3.5 DC checks to 1E/0E Xin6 rolls
I'm in the middle of converting a Goodman Games Dungeon Crawl Classic for a game as yet to be played, and I ran into this a href="http://www.goodman-games.com/dcc-resources.html"nice set of conversions of some DCCs to 1E[...]Read on >>
For Gold Glory Revisited
As I have switched my personal rules to a href="http://www.swordsandwizardry.com/"Swords Wizardry/a, I am revisiting my ideas for span style="font-style:italic;"For Gold and Glory/span. Instead of being a personalized v[...]Read on >>
Befriend, ride and obliterate bugs in Dragonfly by Jeffrey Schecter
Starship Troopers meets Pokemon in Dragonfly, a near-future Science Fiction RPG. Humans live alongside bugs. Some bugs you might want to eat. Some might want to eat you. Some might be your friends, pets, protector or tra[...]Read on >>
Pockets Worth Picking
Well, I’ve missed a few days due to real life (i.e. drinking binge with friends in town for the week). I’ve got a lot planned for the next few days: Play Session 3.2 Skill Challenge + Combat = Awesome Sort of[...]Read on >>
Galactica’s Plot Points in 4E DD
When I reviewed the Battlestar Galactica RPG last year I wasn’t completely blown away, but it did have one thing that really excited me: Plot Points. They could be used for several things, like re-rolling a busted[...]Read on >>
Word of Wizards – April Editorial Calendar
a href="http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/4dnd/calendar"April Editorial Calendar/abr /br /The calendar of freebies and subscriber treats is here and not a day too soon. After having a brief look, there a few highl[...]Read on >>
Necessary Evil: Elder Lehman
Race: Human Attributes: Agility d8, Smarts d10, Spirit d12, Strength d4, Vigor d4 Skills: Fighting d4, Guts d6, Knowledge: History d6+2 , Knowledge: Latin d4+2, Knowledge: Ancient Greek d4+2, Knowledge: Ancient Egyptian [...]Read on >>
Crossover Games
Cross-genre, or crossover games are very popular. One of the more common are cyberpunk/goth games but almost anything can be crossed for an original setting and game that is fresh and new. Recently, I stumbled across a[...]Read on >>
Cloak of Asps
This ornate, knee-length cloak of serpent skin glistens and glitters as it moves, each scale of the carefully prepared hides catching the light like tiny sequins. The many individual skins are sewn into a larger represen[...]Read on >>
“This Means War!”: Making huge armies practical (Part 5 of 6)
March 31, 2009 from Campaign Mastery
Filed under: 3.x, Adventure Prep, DM Advice, Encounter Design, Game Mastering, Game Mastery, Play, RPG Hub, Running Encounters, behind the screen
This is part five of an article on how to referee a war in an rpg. Not one that happens in some distant country, or a neighbouring city, but up close and personal - so close that the PCs can touch it. And not some small [...] Filed under: 3.x, Adventure Prep, DM Advice, Encounter Design, Game Mastering, Game Mastery, Play, RPG Hub, Running Encounters, behind the screen
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“This Means War!”: Making huge armies practical (Part 6 of 6)
March 31, 2009 from Campaign Mastery
Filed under: 3.x, Adventure Prep, DM Advice, Encounter Design, Game Mastering, Game Mastery, Play, RPG Hub, Running Encounters, behind the screen
This is the final part of a 6-part article on how to referee a war in an rpg. Not one that happens in some distant country, or a neighbouring city, but up close and personal - so close that the PCs can touch it. And not [...] Filed under: 3.x, Adventure Prep, DM Advice, Encounter Design, Game Mastering, Game Mastery, Play, RPG Hub, Running Encounters, behind the screen
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Standing in the Rain With a Lightning Rod
As I mentioned before, I’m already working on notes for an Exalted campaign, but perhaps it’s time for me to explain my motives. The reason why I’m making an Exalted campaign of my own is because I want[...]Read on >>
Only 1 day left to register for the RPG Bloggers Campaign Setting
Just a quick reminder that tomorrow is the deadline to register. Click here for all the details. There are already 27 bloggers ready to contribute to this project, so if you want in, register now! [...]Read on >>
The Church of the Radiant Polyhedron
Mad Brew founds the Church of the Radiant Polyhedron, where all gamers can find solace. Perhaps he has been sniffing the fumes from the Lab for too long, or maybe he might just be on to something...[...]Read on >>
How to Manage Multiple Characters
You’ve decided to create a second character, you’ve mapped out the concept, and you’re ready to set the character loose in a role-playing game. You have a new personality to explore, new adventures to p[...]Read on >>
Summon Berserk Bigfoot
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Don’t Skip the Slow Parts
Does this sound familiar? We’re going to skip the next three rooms of the dungeon. There are no traps, no monsters and no treasure. I want to speed things along so we can get to the good part. I’m ashamed to admit th[...]Read on >>
Guest post: Five Intelligent Magic Items for the Connoisseur
Over on my own blog, Exchange of Realities, I’ve been working on advice for creation, personality, interaction and plot hazards of intelligent magic items. But it can be hard to make a magic item from whole cl[...]Read on >>
The Week In Geek…
A round-up of geeky news you might have missed...br /br /a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_jvBFHkK2ZXc/ScqvP75WiEI/AAAAAAAAETM/qIK1GTOKq_A/s1600-h/Blackest+Night+0.jpg"img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5317254998375434306" style=[...]Read on >>
Setting as Character: How the Writer Sees It
You often hear, sometimes in GM advice but more often in writing workshops, that it’s not enough to simply have a setting; instead, the setting needs to be a character in and of itself. This is interesting advi[...]Read on >>
Contemplating some themes.
Last month, I had a "theme week" of sorts and posted seven days of dragons. It was entertaining to work with a common thread and see what I came up with, and I must admit I'm rather tempted to try it again. The questio[...]Read on >>
Monster: Shining Jelly
Shining JellyArmour Class: 8Hit Dice: 4**Move: 60' (20')Attacks: 1Damage: 2-16 + specialNo. Appearing: 1-6Save As: F3Morale: 12Treasure Type: NilAlignment: ChaoticXP Value: 175A strange gelatinous creature -- essentiall[...]Read on >>
Theseus Class Medium Starfighter
As I mentioned before I am working on a SF campaign setting for d6 Space. One of the things my players requested were space battles featuring space fighters much like in games like Wing Commander or FreeSpace. As inspira[...]Read on >>
High Adventure and Low Humor
blockquoteBut if serious purpose is integral to a successfully ongoing campaign, there must be moments of relief as well. Such counterplots can be lesser and different themes within the whole whether some side dungeon or[...]Read on >>
Anyone found any ODD podcasts?
I listen to a lot of podcasts, but the few D&D-related ones I’ve found are all firmly in the 3.5/PF or the 4E camp. What I’m wondering is if there’s any sort of grognard’s/old-school oriente[...]Read on >>
Collateral 05 – System vs. Setting
Collateral is a production of the Accidental Survivors. You can hear more episodes of the Accidental Suvivors at Libsyn. All music provided by Mindscape Music.Collateral 05 - System vs. Setting LinksInspectres the Gum[...]Read on >>
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