Platonic Solid

With Swords & Wizardry being such a hit with my niece and nephew , my wife and I decided to put something together for them as a Christmas Gift. The result is the Ultimate Christmas 2011 Boxed Set.

Over the Thanksgiving holiday I ran an impromptu game with my niece (7) and nephew (9). I fully expected the 9 year old to get into the game and he did but the 7 year old took it to a different level of sophistication. When I first explained the concept of an RPG to the kids I told them that it was a fantasy game where you create a character and play in a story. My nephew asked if it was something that you did on the Wii. My niece corrected him. She announced that it's when you create a fairytale and play it out with your character. Along with the niece and nephew, their mom who used to game with me when we were kids jumped into the game along with my wife who games with me now. I chose Swords & Wizardry WhiteBox for its fast and loose nature based on rulings. No stock characters here. I wanted the kids to have the ability to craft their characters from the very start. We began with rolling 3D6 for attributes and went right to starting gold and equipment. They loved picki...

Now that Firefight!  is out I'm looking at projects that have been set aside to pick back up. I'm giving serious consideration to Adventurer .

It's been quiet here for a while now. On top of renovating an old house It's also been because I've been quite busy writing software  for making EPUBs, creating an EPUB for distribution, navigating the (sometimes byzantine) paths to the Apple and Google eBook stores, and creating the website for our game Firefight! The Tactical Roleplay Engine. It's been a lot of work but so worth it.

In the first article I talked about how we got Agile. The second article covered how to create a basic but useful Kanban board. This article gives an overview of a Kanban board used specifically for game design. The board is the one that we actually use.

We ran our test scenario where the heroine wakes to hear the village being attacked by goblins and orcs. The orc chieftain is kidnapping the mayor's son while his warg and warband wait outside. Here's how it went. Upon being driven awake by a commotion outside, our heroine leaps from her bed and tests her LUCK. Can she don her armor and gather her weapons before being intruded upon by those who are making the martial racket? With ease. She stands beside the window of her upstairs room and looks across the window to see a gaggle of goblins smashing about and setting torch to thatched roof. Slowly she swings the window open and takes aim. With arrow loosed she reaches for another. The arrow finds its mark and the first goblin falls to his knees. One of the goblin's companions turns to pull him from out of the street in order to preserve a sword swinger for when the archer is found. Another arrow is launched and the second goblin falls victim. Goblin heads swivel to find the s...

I like making character sheets so when I got my hands on the new Advanced Fighting Fantasy I had to give it a go. Here it is in PDF .

Advanced Fighting Fantasy landed on the doorstep yesterday. I'm only about half way through but I'm absolutely loving it. I played the game books as a kid and extrapolated from them a stand-alone system when I didn't even properly know what an RPG was. The 1989 version never made it to my hands which makes this reading adventure all the more fantastic. More to come.

I just finished reading Bulldogs! and I have to say that it does indeed kick some serious rump. First off, I have to say that I'm a big, big fan of FATE 3.0. Ever since Spirit of the Century landed in my lap I've been running all sorts of games with the engine; everything from Lord of the Rings to Star Wars to Macross. This is the first FATE release since Diaspora to really grab me. Why? Because it hews back toward Spirit of the Century while bringing a refined sense of, well, sensibility and guidance. The turn back toward SotC tacks closer to my heart. I love that full-wide-open feeling that I get when contemplating and running a game. While reading Bulldogs! I couldn't help think about mashups with both Diaspora and Starblazer Adventures. From Diaspora will come clusters as well as the mini-games. I'm not sure how to run social combat without them anymore. And I can easily see going the other way - using Diaspora for the base while pulling over gear and Resources fr...

I've been reading as many responses to the release of Goodman Games Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG as I could since the game has piqued my interest. A few observations: More than once the use of Zocchi Dice was described as a gimmick. In 1974 D&D must have been hella-gimmicky. What were they thinking? And I've noticed a sense of anxiety over following various game approaches and rules. Guys, we're talking about a game that's about OLD SCHOOL gaming. Don't worry about Every-Single-Rule. If something doesn't sit quite right with you then don't use it or change it. If you roll something on a chart that doesn't quite fit then roll again. If you feel like making your changes is too much work and it'd be easier to play what you already have then it's a piece of cake. Now, to finally check out the game itself.

The month is zooming by and this is the first post for May? Geez. I haven't played anything at all for the last few months. I have a big home remodeling project coming up which will push the play-less period out a little farther but it won't last forever. The first games in the queue are TechNoir and Dungeon World .

This article is much more practical than the first. It covers how to create and use a basic Kanban board for game design.

Over at my technical blog I launched the first article on Agile Game Design . I figured that some folks who check this corner of the 'net from time to time may find it interesting. If you'd rather leave a comment here that's no problem as I regularly check both sites.

When I discovered Castles & Crusades back in the neighborhood of 2007 I heard about the mystical Castle Keeper Guide . Intrigued, I placed an order for the C&C Player Handbook and Monsters & Treasure manual. While my books were en route I was hoping that the CKG would soon be available for purchase so as to round out the collection and so that I would have everything that I would need at my fingertips. After the books arrived and I had gotten some table time with them I realized that I didn't really need any more so-called core books. The game simply worked. And heck, I already had a shelf of older material with which I could plug any holes, both real and perceived. I don't have any personal insight but I'm suspecting that this played a big part in why it took as long as it did to get the CKG put together. It couldn't be yet another GM guide. As the years reeled by the CKG percolated in the background. Questions were asked and were answered but it seemed lik...