#RPGaDay 2017: Day 31

31st) What do you anticipate most for gaming in 2018?

I can't narrow this to just one answer, so here are some of the things I look forward to in 2018:

• The rest of the Return to Freeport adventure series, which will be gathered in a print collection in February. 
• Hopefully getting back to GenCon again.
• Continuing my "Time of the Tarrasque" and Tales from the Yawning Portal campaigns.
• Getting my act together to finally get the Miskatonic Regional Elementary School LARP ready for a second run.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 30

30th) What is an RPG genre-mashup you would most like to see?

I've thought long and hard about this, and finally decided that the mash-up that I would most like to see is one that I helped write back in 1998. As I mentioned in my "LARPs in Limbo" column last fall, I would like to polish up Miskatonic Regional Elementary School for a second run someday. To give you an idea of how many genres get mashed into that one little game--and to push myself to do some some more work on it--here's the player handout (or "bluesheet") about the game's premise:

-----

Bluesheet: The Big School District Merger

The past year has been a turbulent time for the Miskatonic River Valley school district. Due to the prolonged recession, state and federal funding has dried up and nearly every school in the district faced closing unless they merged.

Before now, the district was home to four elementary schools:

Miskatonic Elementary has served the children, spawn, and other assorted offspring of the families, spore beds, and parthenogenic amorphous masses of historic, haunted Arkham for over a century. The school is large, both in student body and in architecture--it has to be, in order for some of the more, um, exotic students to even make it through the doors. Now renamed Miskatonic Regional Elementary School, it has become host to other very specialized schools that were closed in the merger.

Anime Elementary was the school of choice for the local mecha operators, space fighter pilots, alien sex demons, cute tiny auto mechanics, and weapons dealers in the high-tech townships north of Arkham. Many of these families had more-or-less mobile residences, so when the school was shut down, most of the students simply transferred outside the district. A few families decided to keep their kids in the same school district, so those ended up at Miskatonic.

W.D. Memorial was located in Filmland, to the east. Few parents here were willing to move away from their show-business careers. Some were affluent enough to afford private schooling, but most just enrolled their kids in the nearest possible school. Miskatonic gained many talented and fascinating students as a result.

The Atlantean Private School for Boys was located offshore a few dozen miles south of Arkham. Wealthy superheroes sent their sons here to be properly trained in the use and control of their powers. Unfortunately for the school, some supervillains also sent their children there. An ill-considered comment on a report card last spring kindled the fires of rage, so to speak, in the heart of one of the more volatile parents. Luckily, all of the students were away on a field trip that day. They returned home to find not the welcoming domes of the underwater school, but the cooling lava of a new mountain range. Although no villain has publicly claimed responsibility, the modus operandi has narrowed the search to one particular suspect. Dr. Volcano, however, is in hiding and refuses to comment on the disaster.

The first couple months of this school year were rather challenging, as both the returning Miskatonic students and the newcomers adjusted to sharing a common school. The principal, Mr. Black, has dealt promptly and efficiently with fights, accidents, and other disturbances, which has greatly reassured the parents of new students who might have had any qualms about Arkham's sinister reputation. (Most potential troublemakers, on the other hand, live in terror of the harsh and seemingly omniscient Mr. Black.)

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 29

29th) What has been the best-run RPG Kickstarter you have backed?

Pretty much all of the Kickstarters by Green Ronin that I've backed (Advanced Bestiary, Freeport: The City of Adventure, Blue Rose AGE, The Book of the Righteous). They've had their hiccups and delays, as most Kickstarters do, but the Ronins have always been very up-front about any issues and how they were going to be resolved, and the final product has always been worth the wait.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 28

I'm starting a new job tomorrow, so don't know how much free time I'm going to have this week. I've decided to go ahead and post the rest of these today.

28th) What film/series is the biggest source of quotes in your group?

It's probably a toss-up between Monty Python and the Holy Grail and The Princess Bride, but the Star Wars movies rank pretty high on the list, too.

I recently saw a gamer post online (I wish I could recall who or where) about how they vastly prefer The Princess Bride quotes to Holy Grail at their table. They had found that the former don't spawn as many follow-up quotes, and thus they derail the game far less.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 27

27th) What are your essential tools for good gaming?

• Plenty of writing materials for making notes during the game. I usually use a composition notebook to take notes during each session I run, for future reference. (It's also a great memory aid for when I type up the summaries of each session for this blog.) I also keep a pad of scratch paper handy for tracking initiative, sketching maps and symbols to show the players, and any other writing needs.
• A good battle grid. I've used wet-erase mats in the past, but my current preference is 1"-gridded easel pads. My art skills let me easily draw maps freehand during play, but it often saves precious play time to draw out the more complicated maps ahead of time. And using an easel pad lets me keep maps that I might want to reuse later.
• A good supply of dice. Have enough for all the rolls that your character makes on a regular basis, and at least one of each other die type the game uses. If you're the GM, have multiples of each kind of die (and possibly an extra set or two if a player forgets to bring theirs). 
• Robin's Laws of Good Game Mastering, by Robin D. Law. This short booklet (only 38 pages) has a lot of solid advice about how to be a better GM. I reread it about once a year or so just to refresh my memory and remind me to pay attention. 

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 26

26th) Which RPG provides the most useful resources?

GURPS. I haven't played GURPS in about 15 years, but I still own a shelf full of GURPS historical sourcebooks, and have used them as references for games using very different rules systems. For example. I've used GURPS Greece, Egypt, Celtic Myth, Places of Mystery, and Fantasy Bestiary, among others, for my BESM Greek myth campaign; and GURPS China, Places of Mystery (again), and Arabian Nights when working on a Silk Road caravansarai LARP.

I also tend to reread sourcebooks that contain conspiracy/secret history/alternate history/occult content (GURPS Illuminati, Atlantis, Cabal, Atomic Horror, Warehouse 23, Monsters, etc.) every few years, because I've long wanted to try running a game of that sort. If I ever do, it probably won't be in GURPS, but I would be constantly using those sourcebooks throughout the game.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 25

25th) What is the best way to thank your GM?

Let them know that you enjoy playing in their game. Give them good feedback about what you like about the campaign, what you want to see more of (or less of), what has you confused and needs more clarification (apart from obvious in-game mysteries--but if those are consistently frustrating, tell the GM), and what you would like to do with your character as the game progresses.

Money, game books, LEGO, and food are all strictly optional, but rarely refused. ;)

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 24

24th) Share a PWYW publisher who should be charging more.

I don't make much use of Pay What You Want publishers, but I did look into some of the DM's Guild offerings when Wizards of the Coast highlighted a few of them in their "Unearthed Arcana" series. Stray Chow Chow's "Druid Circle - Circle of the Beast" (Price: Free--not even PWYW!) stood out as providing animal companions to druids, which was a staple of the class in previous editions. It allowed me to convert my daughter's Pathfinder druid to 5E without losing the one feature that had sold her on the class in the first place.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 23

23rd) Which RPG has the most jaw-dropping layout?

This is a difficult question for me to answer, partly because "jaw-dropping" is not a word that often occurs to me when considering RPG books, and partly because I own a number of quite lovely RPG products.

I've already mentioned the full-color interior art of Blue Rose, Second Edition (see Day 12). The book's art director and graphic designer, Hal Mangold, has been making Green Ronin books look amazing for quite some time now, and he keeps finding ways to outdo himself time and time again. Other titles that Hal has designed in the past 2-3 years include Freeport: The City of Adventure, the Freeport Bestiary, and The Book of the Righteous--and those are just the gems that I personally own.

Apart from Hal's work, the first book that occurs to me is Big Eyes Small Mouth, Second Edition. The rulebook was in full color, with a bright, bold layout and lots of lots of colorful anime-style art throughout. (Sadly, I lost my copy in a flood. My Second Edition Revised book survived; it reproduced most of the art, but often at a smaller size and only in black and white.) The BESM Third Edition rulebook was full color and quite pretty as well, but it just wasn't as lush in presentation as the Second Edition.

And finally, I composed most of this post ahead of time, before I bought the Starfinder Core Rulebook last week, but that book deserves at least an honorable mention here.

#RPGaDay 2017: Days 18-22 (Eclipse Edition)

My family and I will be traveling the next few days to see the total eclipse and do general sightseeing in Nashville, so I've decided to post my answers to the next few days' questions now.

18th) Which RPG have you played the most in your life?
19th) Which RPG features the best writing?
20th) What is the best source for out-of-print RPGs?
21st) Which RPG does the most with the least words?
22nd) Which RPGs are the easiest for you to run?

18th) Which RPG have you played the most in your life?

This is an easy one: Dungeons & Dragons. I've been playing and DMing one edition or another of that game ever since I was first introduced to RPGs in middle school around 35 years ago. I played Basic and Expert in middle school, Advanced in high school, and 2nd Edition in college. I promptly adopted v.3.0 and v3.5 when they were released, but didn't care for 4th Edition much, so continued running and playing v.3.5 until my group decided to switch to Pathfinder a few years ago. Fifth Edition has won me back, and I'm running it for my kids so we can all learn the new rules.

19th) Which RPG features the best writing?

I'm not sure how to judge the "best" writing, but I would have to say that the Buffy and Angel RPGs are the two rulebooks that have been the most entertaining to read. Most RPG rulebooks tend to get pretty dry reading after a while, but very little of the Buffy core rulebook is. The prose is very conversational, and peppered with witticisms in the style of the TV series--but that casual, snarky style never gets in the way of explaining the rules clearly.

20th) What is the best source for out-of-print RPGs?

Given my shopping habits, I'd have to say RPG hobby shops and used book stores.

Many game stores will have a used game section, where items are greatly discounted. When I lived in Boston, my FLGS (Pandemonium Books and Games) had a rather extensive used game section, with most items marked at half the cover price. Some games languish on the used shelves because they just aren't good enough to sell even at a discount, but you can occasionally find a real gem among the dross. Pandemonium also had a "Black Hole" clearance shelf for items (both used and new) that hadn't moved in far too long; as time passed, those items moved to gradually more discounted shelves, ending at 90% off if still not sold.

Used bookstores will sometimes have role-playing games sections. Both Half Price Books stores in my area (Lexington, KY) have a full bay of RPG books, from a wide variety of games, both recent and venerable. Though none of the following were out of print, I scored a huge pile of Pathfinder hardcovers at HBP last year, and discovered the OneDice system there, which I bought for my kids.

21st) Which RPG does the most with the least words?

Fate Accelerated Edition. This 48-page book distills all the essential elements of the Fate system into a compact, streamlined game that can be used for almost any adventure genre.

This system is used in many of Evil Hat Production's recent games, like the new edition of Dresden Files. My one opportunity to play it so far was a short campaign using Do: Fate of the Flying Temple.

Best of all, the rulebook is available as a pay-what-you-like PDF from the Evil Hat website, or for only $5 in print.

22nd) Which RPGs are the easiest for you to run?

BESM Third Edition and D&D Fifth Edition. I'm sure that I would find BESM a lot more work to run for any campaign that was not a solo game, but for that, it's served us extremely well.

I'm still learning D&D 5E, but the rules are far, far simpler than any edition since 2nd, and it still captures the classic feel of the game. Running published adventures for my kids (Lost Mine of Phandelver and The Sunless Citadel) has been pretty easy so far. And it's the first edition in a while that I would not feel completely overwhelmed using to run the massive and dangerous Expedition to the Barrier Peaks (which, as I've discussed here before, is a goal of mine).

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 17

17th) Which RPG have you owned the longest but not played?

Spaceship Zero, from Green Ronin. It was published in 2002, and I acquired a copy in early 2003. It's based on the album of the same name by The Darkest of the Hillside Thickets, and was designed (and partly illustrated) by members of the band. It's a quirky mix of '50s radio-serial SF tropes and Lovecraftian horror (the main villains, the Hydronauts, are clearly "Deep Ones in spaaaaaace"). I've compiled some unofficial errata for the game, but never played it.

GURPS Fourth Edition (Steve Jackson Games, 2004) is a close second. I played a lot of GURPS Third Edition back in the '90s, but my regular group had drifted off to other games (primarily D&D v.3.0/v.3.5) by the time 4E came out, so we never made the move to that rules set. Which is a shame, because I won a copy of the Basic Set through the 4E iconics lookalikes contest when SJ Games was first promoting the new edition. (I built the warbot C31R07 in LEGO. My strategy of appealing to Evil Stevie's other hobbies worked!) I also sold a single 4E article to Pyramid ("The Mirror Dance: Playing Twins in GURPS," June 24, 2005).

#RPGaDay 2017: Days 15-16

My kids start school tomorrow, so to give myself one less thing to worry about then, I've decided to post tomorrow's question along with today's. And as you'll see, they're closely related questions.

My regular weekly blog will still be posted Wednesday or Thursday. This week's installment will feature a new "Time of the Tarrasque" session.

15th) Which RPG do you enjoy adapting the most?

Call of Cthulhu. Apart from trying one of the brief solo adventures back in college (when my roommate owned a copy), I have never played Call of Cthulhu using Chaosium's original BRP rules. I have, however, acquired a sizable CoC library, and have adapted it for use in other game systems: I ran a couple short GURPS campaigns using the rules in GURPS CthulhuPunk; I've co-written a short, silly LARP titled "Miskatonic Regional Elementary School"; and I've run three campaigns in Green Ronin's Freeport setting, which is steeped in Lovecraftian horror. I'm also partly responsible for the volume of Cthulhu Mythos elements that appeared in the long-time Buffy campaign I played in; my first character pitch was a essentially a Deep One hybrid, and the GM gleefully ran with it.

16th) Which RPG do you enjoy using as-is?

That's a tough question, as I tend to make up my own material for almost every system that I play for any significant length of time. But at the moment, I'd have to say Dungeons & Dragons, Fifth Edition. Most of my homebrewing efforts are currently dedicated to my Pathfinder campaign, so for now, I just use what's in the 5E core rulebooks and the canned adventures that I'm running. That's plenty good enough for my kids as they learn the system and I get more comfortable with running it.

(Of course, anyone who follows my blog knows that I'm interested in trying a Freeport 5E game someday, and that will involve a lot of conversion from previous editions. But for now, my answer stands.)

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 14

14th) Which RPG do you prefer for open-ended campaign play?

Pathfinder and BESM Third Edition.

My current gaming group's game of choice is Pathfinder. I've used that system for my most recent Freeport campaign, and for my current "Time of the Tarrasque" game (which technically has a planned end point around 20th level or so, but it's going to take us a few years of game play to get there, and I have very little planned out between now and then).

I use BESM 3E for the solo Greek myth campaign that I run for my wife. That game is extremely open-ended, though after 10 years of play, I'm actively trying to work out a suitable climactic stopping place for us in the near(ish) future.

D&D 5E will probably end up taking BESM's place as one of my go-to games once I master the system a bit more. I'm currently running published 5E modules for my kids, since Tarrasque takes up so much of my "create new stuff" headspace.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 13

13th) Describe a game experience that changed how you play.

One of the game experiences that has most changed how I play didn't seem to be that profound at the time; it was just a matter of convenience. In my very first "Studded Plate" column (at BigBlueDie), I discussed the events that led to me adopting the use of LEGO minifigures instead of conventional miniatures. These days, I use LEGO minifigures and models as much as possible in my games, and I launched this blog in large part to share the tips and techniques that I've learned in the 15+ years since I made that change.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 12

12th) Which RPG has the most inspiring interior art?

I can't really decide between Blue Rose, Earthdawn, and Pathfinder.

Blue Rose, especially the Second Edition (for AGE), is packed full of beautiful art depicting the romantic fantasy genre. The AGE version also includes Stephanie Law's covers from the original True20 line, repurposed as two-page spreads at the beginning of the players' world, and GM's sections.

Earthdawn has a great deal of black and white interior art depicting the races, cultures, and creatures of Barsaive. The quality varies greatly, but taken as a whole, they convey the look and feel of the setting quite well. The first edition even had a few color plates of the races, famous sites, and other scenes.

And Pathfinder books almost always do a good job of depicting a wide diversity of people, creatures, and locations typical of a d20 fantasy setting. I'm especially fond of the Wayne Reynolds portraits and module covers that been repurposed as interior art in the Core Rulebook and elsewhere.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 11

11th) Which 'dead game' would you like to see reborn?

Big Eyes Small Mouth. When Guardians of Order folded due to financial troubles, the Third Edition of the game had not yet been printed. White Wolf finally published the book under their Arthaus imprint, but no support for the new edition was ever produced.

For the past decade, I've been using BESM 3E for "The Kynthiad," a solo Greek myth campaign that I run for my wife Erika. I would like to try it out in the context of another campaign (either as player or GM), but haven't had the opportunity yet. I considered BESM for my "Winds of Freeport" campaign before settling on D&D v.3.5. (You can see my preliminary conversion notes for that here.) If I ever return to my "Adventures of Arcadayn" setting, BESM is one of the systems that I would consider using instead of GURPS (and the wiki already has some partial conversion notes for BESM 3E).

#RPGaDay 2017: Days 9-10

(My answer for Day 10 is very short, so I've added it to this post instead of doing it separately tomorrow.)

9th) What is a good RPG to play for about 10 sessions?

Most RPGs are well suited to a story arc that takes about 10 sessions. For a Buffy or Angel game, 10 episodes is just about right for a first season, or a stand-alone "mini-series." A longish published d20 adventure can often take about 10 sessions, and can allow the party to level a couple of times, depending on the scenario.

BESM (any edition) and Fate Accelerated Edition are good choices for more rule-light games in this time-frame. My first experience running BESM was a fantasy mini-campaign using Second Edition. I could have easily stretched that game to 10 sessions, but we reached a perfectly satisfactory resolution after five somewhat-longer-than-usual sessions.

The FAE game that I mentioned yesterday made it to 8 sessions before scheduling issues sidelined it; just a couple more sessions could have given it the proper closure it needed.

10th) Where do you go for RPG reviews?

My answers to this are pretty much the same as to Day 3's question (How do you find out about new RPGs?).

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 8

8th) What is a good RPG to play for sessions of 2 hrs or less?

Two hours or less is far too short a time for most of the RPG systems I've played. Most of them have complex enough rules that encounters take some time to resolve, especially if combat is involved. The most successful games that I've played in such a short period have been very simple one-shot LARPs, which had extremely minimalist rules and fairly straightforward plots. One of my personal favorites is "Miskatonic Regional Elementary School," which I helped write at an Intercon Build Your Own Game workshop many years ago--and which is my first priority to rewrite if and when I ever get back into LARP.

Fate Accelerated Edition is one of the few systems I know that has light enough rules to fit a satisfactory length session into only a couple hours. When I played in a Do: Fate of the Flying Temple game last year, most of those sessions were about 2-3 hours long.

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 7

7th) What was your most impactful RPG session?

I'm not entirely sure what the folks at RPG Brigade mean by "impactful" here, so I'm going to interpret that very loosely as "What RPG session had the most dramatic effect on you or your character?"

The first answer that comes to mind actually involves two of the innumerable online role-playing threads that my Buffy/Angel group did between regular tabletop sessions. (This is the same campaign that I mentioned on Day 1.)

The original campaign spawned a spinoff series, in which I played Patricia "Trick" Tillinghast, the younger cousin of my hero from the main series. Trick was a normal human who found out that her new best friend was a Slayer. She promptly put her skills as a fencer to help Candace train and hunt demons. Years of dedication to her sport made Trick roughly Candace's equal with a sword, but she lacked a Slayer's strength and stamina. This frustrated her to no end, so when she was given an opportunity to become a Maenad, a champion of the god Dionysus, she jumped at the chance without hesitation. At first, she was thrilled with her new abilities, and even agreed to a further initiation for additional tantric powers. However, Trick was always a bit of a wild child, and becoming a Maenad exacerbated those flaws of character--and worse, she used her new status as an excuse for her own bad behavior. As a result, her relationships with her friends and family suffered--and when she realized just how much of a narcissistic bastard Dionysus really was, that relationship quickly went south, too.

Dionysus wasn't the only god who had interests in Shadowgard, and wasn't even the first one Trick met. The Raven Totem, who went by the name Jonathan Poe in his guise as a local nightclub owner, had been introduced early on as a trickster ally to the local heroes. He and Trick appreciated each other's quirky senses of humor, so had hit it off well from the start. In fact, Poe would have likely chosen her as his champion in Shadowgard if he hadn't already empowered one of the other series' heroes before meeting her. And by the time that Totem Warrior died in battle, creating a vacancy, Trick had entered Dionysus's service. Still, they remained good friends--and that relationship was one of the few that Trick didn't wreck as her life got more and more miserable.

Now we get to the episodes that had the most impact on Trick's career.

As a trickster god, Poe had some limited power to change reality temporarily--for the space of a single day--which he occasionally used as a prank that taught the recipient a lesson. (Body swaps and sex changes were some of his favorites.) He took pity on Trick's predicament, and tried to change reality so that he had actually claimed her as champion before Dionysus could. This stunt backfired dramatically--Trick ended up as a bisexual male champion of Puck (another trickster she had encountered in the past, and was on decent terms with). Trick immediately tracked down Poe at his club to demand an explanation, then after he gave it, she really let him have a piece of her mind. However, Poe couldn't undo the change without Puck's assent, so Trick had to negotiate with the fairy to release her. She had discovered during her tantrum at Poe that his regard for her had left him very sensitive to her moods, to the point of this whole fiasco (and her reaction to it) leaving him with a galloping migraine. Trick managed to quite politely and cleverly persuade Puck that he didn't really want to have her mad at him, too, and the spell was undone: She was a Maenad again.

Trick's success at extricating herself from that mess gave her the confidence to confront Dionysus and tell him that she was through being his champion. The god replied, with infuriating smugness, that she had no choice in the matter--she's drunk his wine, so she was a Maenad. Trick snapped, drew the sword that Dionysus had given her when she became his champion a year before, and lunged for him--she preferred to die, if need be, rather than serve him any longer.  Dionysus simply vanished and reappeared a short distance away, but her sheer audacity in attacking him had impressed him--it reminded him of the old fighting spirit that had drawn him to her in the first place. He relented, giving her a choice in order to be rid of her Maenad's blood--either drink his wine again to burn it away, or bleed it away with a knife. For Trick, the wine embodied her of all her bad choices over the past year. Besides, she was a warrior at heart, so she chose the blade. She had intended to make a shallow cut, but the wound bled far more profusely than she expected, and she soon passed out. When she came to, the god was gone; she was alone in the woods, and dangerously weak from blood loss. She was also deliriously happy to no longer answer to a god. When some of the local demons stumbled across her in this state, she actually started laughing uncontrollably. (Fortunately, another local spirit ally chased them off and got her safely out of the woods.)

Trick would soon find out that she wasn't completely free of all the effects of her time as a Maenad. Being connected to the mystical world always leaves a mark, and she started having psychic visions. Because she was merely human now, they took a physical toll on her. (Compare Cordelia after she received Doyle's parting gift on Angel.) But how Trick dealt with that new problem is another story...

Trick Tillinghast, by Tim Emrick (2006)

#RPGaDay 2017: Day 6

6th) You can game every day for a week. Describe what you'd do!

The closest I've ever come to gaming every day for a week was attending GenCon in 2011. Playing for a full week would probably require me to game in my hometown, so I'll answer with that in mind.

I'd run a session of my "Time of the Tarrasque" Pathfinder campaign, and run another D&D 5E session for my kids--preferably with a few days off from GMing in between!

I'd try to persuade Erika to run more of her Earthdawn campaign, and see if my daughter is finally ready to try running the One Dice Raptors RPG that we gave her last year.

And if I could find people to run them for me, I'd try out Blue Rose AGE, GURPS 4E, Spaceship Zero, and maybe some flavor of Star Wars game (or Starfinder, which I will have an opportunity to try out Very Soon Now[tm]). Playing some Pathfinder and 5E that I didn't have to run myself would be nice, too.