Questing for Tabletop Adventure Games
Split the black sea. Shipwright. Every book is a sourcebook. Read books more than rulebooks. Learn, grow, and contribute. Negotiation "Never Split the Difference" is a book about getting what you want in an agreeable, harmonious manner. It was written by a man who settled hostage negotiations for the FBI. The title comes from these … Continue reading Never Split the Difference
Shipwright I'm running everything at the table out of a 1" binder with pockets. Here's what's inside: Front pocket Adventure Hour!Maze Rats20-some index cardsTiny 2d6 in a bagAdventure World one page rules and character packages (we've been marking off character packages so every character is unique).Bastionland name list (alphabetical and by failed career)Dungeon World GM … Continue reading Current setup and recent findings (2022)
Shipwright Your players love you. And though I know nothing else about you, that is enough.
The Hobbit A spectrum of table styles with two extremities: crystalized and fluid. Crystalized. The world is set in stone. The GM or an intellectual property has declared its boundaries. Details are made ahead of time like calendars with holidays and festivals, towns with maps and points of interests, major factions with motivations and rosters, … Continue reading Adventure World Chassis
"These hands! These amazing hands are destined to create undreamt-of wonders, and yet here they're worn to bone and unfulfilling drudgery! What a monstrous injustice! Chris McDowall and I got to talking about Into the Odd and its derivatives on the Bastionland podcast. We got how I got my start writing, my influences, and what … Continue reading Into the Odd Remastered Commentary
Shipwright. Inspired by this post and this quote from Sean McCoy: I feel like almost any game could be made better by taking the monster manual and just writing The before every monster. Let’s combine a few thoughts: 1) Limits on a world are good. Not everyone can be a Jedi, there aren’t a million rings of … Continue reading “The” Checklist Campaign
Been a while since we've had a Shipwright piece around here... This is a sequel to the Diceless Violence post. Main takeaways: Dice can cheapen victories and deliver cheaper losses.Diceless combat (no to-hit rolls, no damage rolls) moves the game away from elements of luck to strategy and critical thinking.In order to make combat a … Continue reading Decisive Combat
From Adventure Hour!: To use animals as loyal pets, make them friendly, smart, or powerful, but not all three. Let's give some meat to these words: Friendly Likes owner, likes strangers, empathetic.Opposite: Jerk, doesn’t care, needs to be motivated Smart Independent, adaptable, courageousOpposite: Clumsy, afraid, needs to be told what to do Powerful Skilled, effective, … Continue reading Playing with Youngers: Pets
In the practice of meditation, you are often told to focus on the breath. Each breath is life-giving. You can’t be without it. And try as you might, focus with all your effort, and your mind will still wonder. One might posit that if you had perfect focus, you would be able to retain all … Continue reading Focus on the World: Return to Play
In this article, the Angry GM answers questions from folks. This question stuck out to me and it's something I've been thinking about for my own games: I like published settings with rich, detailed histories. Like Eberron. But my players won’t read the sourcebooks. Consequently, they don’t really understand the setting. How do I handle my … Continue reading Focus on the World: The players are tourists
DREAMING DRAGONSLAYER 