Tag: #ttrpgwriter

#FlashFicFeb

Flash Fiction February is upon us! Let the good times begin!

I’m having fun with this one.

We’re already on Day 2. I’m amazed at how easy coming up with short short stories has been so far. I kind of like writing vignettes for RPG stuff and this is sort of what it’s like. Speaking of- I have lots of RPG stuff in the mix right now. I’m shamefully past deadline on one project. (I have not forgotten.)

The Day 2:

Focus

#FlashFicFeb Day 2

Charlie kept thinking to himself, “Gotta keep punchin. Gotta keep swingin. Gotta get my guard back up.”

Then there was a loud thump on his left ear. Was that a foot? Is this MMA? Is that the ceiling?

Charlie thought back to his first ever day of boxing. It was a private lesson in his dad’s buddy’s basement gym. He did a little weight training and learned about cardio. He never even strapped the gloves on the first day. Dad’s pal Jim was an expert trainer, though. Charlie remembered thinking about all the trophies on the wall.

“Speed. Power. Focus.” Jim’s words echoed in Charlie’s head from a later lesson.

Wait. Focus? Where are we? Oh, Jeez! That’s the ref. Gotta get up. Gotta stay focused.

Charlie struggled to his feet and shook off some of the many cobwebs. “Gotta stay focused,” he thought.

He answered the ref’s request to continue with a big nod, trying to appear as coherent as possible. For whatever reason, the ref was convinced Charlie was okay to continue. Although the ref did politely remind Charlie that one more of those and he was going to call it.

Charlie’s opponent was a big dude named Downtown Brown. The guy had a wicked right hook. In fairness, the guy had a wicked everything. Charlie was puzzled how this guy wasn’t considered a heavyweight.

Charlie came back out swinging. This time he could hear his trainer, Jim’s oldest son, yelling “Stick and move! Don’t try to stand your ground or this guy’s gonna kill ya!”

He was right. Charlie remembered the fight footage of Downtown Brown’s last three fights. All knockouts. All within the first two rounds. What round was it?

A large red glove connected dead center of Charlie’s face, and everything went black. The mat came right up to greet Charlie’s motionless body. The white towel flew up over the top rope and everyone rushed in to make sure Charlie was still alive.

My Flash Fiction February page can be found here. Sometimes I’ll only be posting excerpts. Other times, the whole story if it’s short enough. I’m here to tell you, 500 words is a walk in the park most of the time. Staying under 500 is a challenge for me.

Part of my ambition for #FlashFicFeb is to do some fanfic stuff and relate some things to RPGs. My first story was actually a brief arc from a Cyberpunk story. Good times. More to come.

Revisions Revisions Revisions

I was having some anxiety again until my loving wife set me straight.

Blog articles are much easier than writing almost anything else.

Photo by Pedro Figueras on Pexels.com

Why? Because if it’s my personal blog, I don’t obsess over every word. I laugh when I see these articles about charging what you’re worth and taking on too many clients. I honestly wonder how anyone does it. Rarely do I receive a straight answer.

I’m super picky about everything I write “professionally.” Like, I agonize when writing adventures. Has this been done before? Is it too cliché’? Are they going to like it? Is it original enough? Would I buy this?

I’m now on a second or third draft of one that I’m working on and ready to go to another story entirely. It’s amazing how many times I’m willing to think and overthink something and still end up changing my mind entirely. But I want everything to be just so if it’s going to represent me in publication. Not to mention I’m super jumpy about criticism after my last job. (Flunked a test for PTSD. That bad.)

My therapist says I have perfectionist and people-pleasing tendencies. LOL! Only all my life. Some people say I’m high strung and have a huge ego. Maybe? But if you knew what a cruel, rotten bastard my inner critic is, you’d get why I might appear high strung.

Stress compounds everything. Looming deadlines, sick kids, sick wife, and sick me don’t help matters. My car needs an oil change. It’s umpteen below zero in Iowa right now. Unemployment is running out. Funniest part is, I brought this on myself to a certain degree.

My wife gave me the best piece of advice ever.

Do you know what she said?

“Just do the damn thing and turn it in!”

After a little more discourse, I decided she’s right. Either my editor will like it or they won’t. It’s either going to sell or it’s not. Regardless of how it pans out, I’m going to survive and grow.

Until next time, stay safe. Please drink lots of fluids, get some rest, and eat your vegetables. Game on.

Nightmares of Mine

Short commentary on an old horror reference book that is a mainstay in my collection of GM advice reverences. I absolutely love GM guides.

I loved reading this book in High School.

It’s a good read even now, but you may have to find the pdf.

I remember this fondly because it was one of the first treatises on game mastery I ever read. I read a lot of books on game mastery back in the day. I still do, but not as frequently. Nightmares of Mine by Kevin Hite and John Curtis. You can find it on Goodreads here. It’s still around in pdf and print anywhere fine rpg resources can be found. I still retain my dog-eared, well-loved, physical copy. It sits on my reference shelf next to my Heritage English Dictionary and my Book of Stagecraft. I still look back at all of the above from time to time.

It’s listed under Rolemaster, probably because both were produced by Iron Crown Enterprises. I loved Rolemaster’s critical tables, but the games themselves weren’t usually at the top of my list. No lie, I had a character die while being created more than once… Spacemaster was fun as a one-shot though. Anyway, Nightmares of Mine really isn’t entirely a nuts-and-bolts RPG book.

It is chock full of good GM and writer advice and I recommend anyone starting any kind of a horror project to give it a once over before you start, especially if you’re new to the genre. This little gem of a book got me through a couple of Call of Cthulhu games, Beyond the Supernatural campaign, and running things in old school Ravenloft. My favorite Storyteller game, Werewolf the Apocalypse benefitted heavily from this as well. That game was so fun…

It’s helpful advice for GMs looking just to improve their technique, especially when it comes to horror, but running games in general as well. Advice on description, pacing, embracing the genre/subgenres as well as safety tools all come into play here. There are also tips and tricks for dealing with different horror subgenres. Be forewarned, a lot of what we have in the RPG community now, wasn’t really discussed as much back then. A lot of the modern horror games we have now hadn’t even been written yet, save Call of Cthulhu. Even if you want your dungeon crawls to be a little scarier, this book is a good catch.

I’ll be curious to see how the advice from Nightmares stacks up with the FATE Horror Toolkit one of these days. I’m still contemplating a Space Horror game one of these days. Probably a one-shot, but maybe a short campaign, depending.

Just wanted to do a short bump for this cool little book. More things to come. Have a great week. Game on!

Freedom Day! Sixth Month Edition.

Getting fired from a job I was really starting to despise was practically a relief. Every month I celebrate my personal freedom. I am so happy and grateful for all of life’s experiences.

I’ve been at this since July 19, 2021.

Since then, I’ve had many wonderful, warm, happy, spiritual experiences. It’s been mostly peaceful, downright pleasant. About the only downside has been the change in stable income. I went from a level I was very comfortable with to, uh… yeah. Still working on that one. But it’s all good.

I will say I don’t miss the grind. We’re getting by okay on one income. The bills are covered. Personally, I’m working on some writing projects and looking for writing jobs so I can pass the goodness onto my friends in the TTRPG community and elsewhere.

There are literally no regrets otherwise. All the crapola that came with that job otherwise? They can keep it. I wish I could say more, but I don’t feel like getting sued. I am a big believer in karma, though.

It was never exactly the plan I intended.

I really mean it. Please take care of your needs and those of your loved ones.

My intentions looked a lot different originally. I intended to be wealthy with a steady enough stream of income to retire somewhere in the Pacific Northwest US and never effectively be heard from again aside from social media and my written work and YouTube. (I still intend to retire to a quiet cabin next to a lake some day.) That was mid-2019, before everything totally went to pieces worldwide.

Needless to say the lockdowns/quarantines from COVID brought us closer as a family. I’m pretty happy being around my family these days. My wife has been extremely loving and understanding about the whole unemployment thing so far. Lord knows I’ve dated women before her that would have kicked me to the curb a lot sooner. Yes, the kids still tend to drive me a little batty, much like any parent, but I love them to pieces.

I originally intended to fulfill a more spiritual mission as it related to Ufology. I wanted to bridge the gap between the nuts-and-bolts ufologists and the more spiritual side of Ufology. While it may happen some day, it probably won’t be me that gets it done. Too many people have too much to lose to give up their stream of income and jaded opinions to cross over to the other side of the fence in both communities. I have more love than ever for the Experiencer community, though.

Mental Health Matters!

Therapy. Needed. Badly…

I remember that night six months ago. They met me at the door and pulled me into a side office. I knew instantly what was going down, reaffirmed by the contents of my desk sitting in a box on the table. I think we’ve all seen this before. All the specifics are kind of a blur because our mind seeks to protect us from pain/trauma. I wasn’t especially hurt or angry. More like slightly annoyed and disappointed.

Really the biggest question in my mind was what to tell the kids. My wife had often said the writing was on the Jumbotron and that it was no real surprise. Yet, my number one biggest concern was for her and the kids.

You know what? It turns out that my loving wife sees me as more than a paycheck. She totally shattered that misconception when she touched my arm and told me it was going to be okay. Not gonna lie, I cried a little over that.

Yes, I’ve had bouts of depression and anxiety since. It happens. It’s normal for many of us, despite the social stigma attached to it. “Cheer up,” and “Don’t worry,” don’t magically make depression and anxiety go away. Honest. Unemployment has done wonders for my anxiety, though. There’s less to worry about when I’m home all day with the cats and no shitz to give otherwise.

My inner critic calls me everything from “deadbeat” to “freeloading loser.”

To him, I say, “Go fly a kite. Soaked in gasoline. In Hell. Don’t care.”

You might have guessed by now that I still need therapy. I’m still in therapy. I was going back to my therapist before they canned me because things had gotten pretty grim mental health wise, anyway. Truthfully, I was pretty relieved not having to go back to that place.

Who knows? Another six months of therapy might even see me wanting to be around people again. I might even go see if I can get hired as a door greeter at the local Wally World. Between my physical and mental health, we know for sure there are certain jobs I won’t touch ever again.

At least I can proudly say my mental health is improving. I know there are a lot of people quitting their jobs right now because they’re tired of the crap. Love them. They’re doing the right thing for it. Employers need to learn what they can’t get away with if they want to retain people. You know what’s truly crazy? Working somewhere that pays less than what one is worth, for long hours, crappy benefits, and harsh criticism.

That’s probably the thing that drove me into therapy the most. It’s one thing to criticize someone’s job performance in the name of improving the company. I get that. But when they literally tell you to internalize that they think you’re less than mediocre? Another reason for me to NEVER set foot in an office environment again. Sorry, I just don’t have the personal resources to handle that. Again, I believe in karma.

I got the boot a couple of weeks after that total downer of a review. No surprise, really. Just annoying. Treat people the way you would want them to treat you. And middle finger on each hand up to corporate America for some of their contrary values.

I am a spiritual being having a physical experience. When I’m not afraid to die, I’m not afraid of anything that can be said to me. However, I still have feelings and free will. Luckily, I choose in every now moment to stay calm, forgive, and remember we’re all here on the Earth plane to have these types of (crappy) experiences. Some day I’ll tell you what all I’ve learned. LOL!

Not a millionaire yet. Just going for joy.

Time to get creative!

I’m not going to do the whole sappy happiness-over-money bit. Money serves a very important function in society. It buys me a lot of things that brings joy, plus it helps people. I love wealth and prosperity. I admire people who have more than I do. Sure. Why begrudge anyone their happiness and prosperity? We should all be so fortunate.

That all said, I can write for enjoyment. I’m not fighting through the chronic pain every day to crawl into work just to be miserable some more. (God/Source/Universe bless you if you do.) I don’t have an overzealous middle management supervisor breathing down my neck and I’m not just a meaningless cog in the corporate machine any more. Years of stress and not taking care of myself in the name of the almighty dollar left me with a wrecked body and tons of pain. Please, do yourself a favor and take care of you, too.

Now, I’m waiting for the good graces of government and/or a remote job to come through. Otherwise, I’m writing for fun and ttrpg money. I’m going to stamp my own personal NaNoWriMo on a month coming up assuming everyone is healthy (and nothing else is going on) to knock out my first actual novel.

What’s all this TTRPG business about?

DMSGuild.com Just one of the places I want to get published.

For those unfamiliar with the term, TTRPG stands for Table Top Role Playing Game. Some would recognize Dungeons & Dragons as probably the most popular ttrpg on the market today. Of course there are literally hundreds of ttrpgs out there in the world in every genre imaginable with as many systems as one would care to learn.

I discovered a very warm, very welcoming #ttrpg community on Twitter a few months ago after the Añjali fracas left a very bad taste in my mouth. My new online friends have helped me realize that running, writing, and discussing roleplaying games truly does make me happy. Remember that whole joy thing? Yeah. That’s my joy.

Plus, having all this time off because employers want to hire me about as bad as I want to work for some of them has given me a lot of time to learn interesting new skills and embrace old ones. I’m getting back into blogging, web design, and social media a bit. Maybe I’ll even do some freelance work along those lines eventually.

I’m looking at dropping some of my own written ttrpg work onto DriveThruRPG, the DMSGuild and possibly starting something on Itch.IO going forward along with some freelance writing jobs in the industry. I’m aspiring for that electrum best seller spot on OneBookShelf.com on at least one of their affiliate sites. Years of being turned down by game companies have taught me the best way into the industry is to just do the darn thing and publish it myself.

This year is looking up so far. Yes, steady income is cool and all, but doing something I love to the point where it is almost indistinguishable from daily living is priceless. Plus I have more family time than ever, which has been nice.

That’s why my blog has mostly changed. I’m still dropping some spiritual stuff here and there along with my personal shares. Mostly, my goal is to post about that which really lights me up now or things I’m passionate about one way or the other. This might be the last Freedom Day update for a while. I’ll keep everyone posted if things change.

If you want to help out and keep this blog going, please consider a donation on Ko-Fi.

Obscure RPGs

There are tons of RPG systems out there besides the standard D&D and fantasy. Go out and explore. Find something new!

“Obscure” being a relative term, I guess.

Today I realized I collect and love a lot of offbeat RPGs. You know, things that aren’t mainstream D&D. I’m not knocking the grandfather of all RPGs or anything. I still love D&D from BECMI on up. But there are so many other RPGs outside of D&D. Heck, there are plenty of genres outside of fantasy to explore.

I see a lot of posts/articles to the effect of “Alternatives to D&D.” I always chuckle at the notion because some of us have embraced this idea for years now. I don’t just mean Pathfinder or Middle Earth, either. I mean alternatives to fantasy rpgs.

Life can be scary away from spell slinging elves with swords.

Personally, I love the mecha genre of anime style games. Good luck ever finding players for that, btw. (I guess they exist somewhere but not around where I live.) WWII gaming has some appeal, but again players seem to be few and far between. (Check out Operation White Box!) Most people go toward Star Wars in its many incarnations because Space Opera is kind of like fantasy’s futuristic cousin.

I think a lot of sci-fi and modern games get a bad rep because “guns are icky.” Truthfully, many of us have had negative experiences with firearms to the point of not wanting to roleplay characters that use them. And there’s also the percentage of the population that knows little to nothing about guns. Swords and spells are easier to figure out, I suppose. The same can be said for modern horror as well, although Call of Cthulhu is still thriving.

I recommend looking into one’s own favorite genre of books, movies, or tv shows for inspiration. Chances are, there’s probably an RPG out there on the market for it or a way to adapt a current system. Generic, universal RPGs are fairly common these days from the d20 System (OGL, D&D rules,) to FATE, D6, Open Legends, Genre Diversion, and dozens more. There are too many to list here and most are adaptable to anything from gritty historical realism to far flung psychedelic future utopian fantasy.

DrivethruRPG is chock full of alternative games.

Full disclosure: I am NOT a spokesman for OneBookShelf or any subsidiaries, but I’ve been a customer for years. It’s a good RPG shopping site for indie games. There’s also a lot of good reviews there if you’re on the fence about buying a new game or game system.

I could go on all day naming good systems and specific RPGs for people to try out, but it might be easier just to go on Itch.io or DrivethruRPG and look around for yourself. Your local used bookstore might also be a good resource for RPGs off the beaten path.

Please consult your group before launching a new campaign or system.

I want to emphasize that some groups may not be ready to do something other than good old D&D. I have friends who absolutely refused to do anything besides D&D. It was the only game they knew. It was the only genre they were comfortable it and you could not get them out of that comfort zone for love or money. To those friends, I said, “Cool. See you next week for D&D.”

Challenging though it may be at times, one can always find a group online somewhere for almost any game imaginable. It might take some time, persistence, and effort to find said players or GM. If lockdowns taught us anything, it’s that there’s a niche out there for just about everyone on the internet. Failing that, I would recommend trying some solo roleplaying. More on that here.

Whatever your game or system of choice is, please do enjoy. I hope your weekend is full of good friends and superb die rolls. Game on.

Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG Review

Thank you Goodman Games.

DCC RPG isn’t even a new game. It’s not even close! But what it is- AWESOME!

I picked up my new physical copy today. It comes in at a whopping $29.99 for 477+ Pages?!? That is unheard-of in this day and age!

And that’s before we even get into the game itself. It’s like Warhammer Fantasy RPG and Hackmaster had a baby and raised it during the era of 3rd Ed D&D. Which, that is partially true given that Goodman started out making DCC adventures during the hay days of the OGL in Third Ed, making throwback style modules. DCC RPG is basically a cut down, streamlined version of the 3rd Ed rules, with a LOT of exceptions that make it a unique and beautiful baby.

It also borrows from the good old BECMI days of D&D with the character races as classes and only seven classes total. There are also only 10 levels to worry about and an experience point system that is anything but overly crunchy or burdensome. The design theory here was- make characters, go on adventures, and have fun.

Artwork sells games. This is from the interior of DCC RPG. Look familiar?

I’ve said for years that artwork sells RPGs.

The “old Grognards” in the crowd will probably recognize the Easter Egg in the image above as a tribute to the First Ed AD&D Player’s Handbook. The art throughout the book is very much in that old T$R style of black and white (mostly) artwork. Some of it can be a little goofy looking, some more serious fantasy. It really takes me back to the old Tunnels & Trolls or Dragon Magazine era in the 1980’s.

This game comes highly regarded and well recognized. I could go on for hours about it.

Even the guy who sold me my softcover today stopped to chat about this game. He said he wished he could get a campaign going for it. If nothing else, we both got a good chuckle at the 0 Level character funnel. “Oops, character A died in the first five minutes. Good thing I have a stack of characters here.”

It’s very much in that old school dungeon crawl game way of doing things. Kick in the front door of the dungeon, smash orcs in the face with your mace, and rescue the elf girl in the chainmail bikini. If you’re really “lucky” you’ll probably get to fight a dragon on dungeon level eight or nine. DCC RPG lends itself well to beer-n-pretzels roleplaying- not too serious or dramatic.

I daresay Matt Mercer and his Critical cast would be seriously confused by how this game is usually run. Don’t even think about making a costume when your character could get mangled in a deathtrap before third level and the GM has no qualms about doing it.

DCC RPG goes all out with superfluous tables and statistics.

I find it amazing for a game that is basically supposed to be rules lite to go so far into what I consider old school style tables. Thieves get bonuses to their skills based on level and alignment. There are tables for spellcasting, talking to a deity, and various dragon styles. You can create new strange humanoid races and customize your dragon’s fighting style in this game. The amount of tables and the types of things they cover really take me back while still being all fresh and new.

Speaking of unique and wonderful concepts, this game uses some freaky dice! d7’s? d24? Because everyone has one of those lying around. Okay, I have d24’s and d30’s but I still have to go out and acquire a set with d7, d14, and d16’s. That’s strange even for me. You have to see for yourself how they’re built into the system, but they’re there. You can also fake it with regular polyhedral dice or find a dice roller for your device of choice. Personally, I like physical dice.

DCC RPG Dice available from Goodman Games, Amazon, and others.

I’m not kidding when I say I could literally go on about this game for hours. I love how it’s laid out. I love the art! Even the dice are appealing. I think I’m probably going to generate a few characters tonight, or at least a stack of 0 Level neophyte characters to see how many live one session in and become actual classed PCs. I’m also going to pull out the random dungeon generator and Grimtooth’s Traps. Remember a while back when I said dungeons didn’t necessarily make a ton of sense back in the day? Yeah… yeah… I’m pretty excited!

As a GM, the most appealing part of this system to me is the monsters. You can customize all of your standard monster types from demons to un-dead, humanoids and dragons. There really aren’t a lot of cookie cutter monsters in this game and the stat blocks are loose and friendly enough that they can be modified easily. The best part- there’s no crunchy experience point system. No CRs and no encounter levels to balance. The party can either rock it and drop it or run away. Running away still gets experience. Okay, maybe not quite as much, but smart and alive is still better than valorous and extremely dead, right? Hopefully the players see it that way.

I really wanted to talk some about all of the cool spells and magic items, but I’ll save that for another time. I’m also thinking seriously about putting some material together for it. I actually give Goodman Games a lot of credit for not putting out a million sourcebooks. Lots of great adventure modules, though. Personally, I want to do a hex crawl campaign with this system.

The game also includes some inspirational reading material for GMs and players. There are open tributes to everyone including Gygax, Arneson, Moldvay and others.

Overall, I give this game very high marks. It is possibly the best rules lite-ish throwback OSR style game going right now. It’s wonderful for us “old Grognards” and young players alike if you’re looking for a change of pace and style. I highly recommend this product with all sincerity.

Until next time, keep those dice rolling. Stay safe. Game on!

New Year, New Everything.

I have not abandoned spirituality, ufology or the beings completely, but I’m stepping a very long way back from talking about it. I’ve been into tabletop roleplaying games for years before awakening.

After a LOT of consideration and thought, I’ve rebranded my site and almost everything else I had going. I’ll briefly get into a couple of reasons for this, primarily because I was just due for a major overhaul.

The first reason that comes to mind is I wanted the look of the site to evolve and reflect the change in content. I was running Sellswordgames.blog. As that site will no longer being used and I am pretty much done with that brand, we’re moving back in here with all my gaming content.

I have not abandoned spirituality, ufology or the beings completely, but I’m stepping a very long way back from talking about it. I’ve been into tabletop roleplaying games for years before awakening. I will still embrace the Universe in all things, thanking Source for all things, and loving life on Gaia each and every day. My focus on love, prosperity, and joy have not gone away, but rather are being rekindled here in a different way.

The second reason is I wanted to take advantage of my primary blog site’s WordPress features. There are a few more options for monetization, etc here than on the free WordPress sites. There are also more/better looking thematic options and plugins I can use.

Lastly, it was just time for some changes. Law of Attraction means getting into that flow state; acting on inspiration, and I really felt like I was getting into a groove at the end of last year. I will still be posting the occasional personal note along with all the cool gaming stuff I have lined up. I’m excited to be up and running again. I have a renewed sense of vigor when it comes to writing and I have a lot of fun projects lined up.

Thank you. Namaste

I am grateful for everyone who follows me and sees this. Thank you! Have a great week and I’ll be back very soon.

FATE?

It attached itself to the hull. At first it was just a nuisance. Then the crew began to change…

Horror? One Shot? In Space?!?

I’m thinking about putting together a one-shot game or possibly a mini campaign. I like FATE because it’s a simple system and easy to work with. I’m not sure what kind of an audience I would have for the kind of adventure I want to write, though.

Some background. I like anime a lot. Much of the material I tend to come up with for funsies in my own head usually revolves around some type of anime game such as OVA, BESM, Gratuitous Anime Gimmick, Mecha Hack, and so on. I’ve played around with a lot of systems over the years. I also love Mecha v Kaiju for FATE, which is roundabout how I got here.

My favorite anime series, of which there are many, is still Neon Genesis Evangelion. I also love Chrome Shelled Regios, Appleseed, Satellizer El Bridget (Freezing,) Macross, and Arpeggio of Blue Steel. I never get tired of anime, especially anything with giant robots. I also loved long Cowboy Bebop before it got popular again (Just ask my wife, who got tired of listening to Real Folk Blues…)

I’m shooting for a change of pace on this one.

Chrome Shelled Regios is getting incorporated into a D&D campaign I’m building, especially the dite. However I still love the idea behind the contaminoids. They had to spread through space, theoretically. And that brings around my love of two other series; Starship Troopers and Aliens.

Here’s kind of the premise for the adventure: The group runs into a distress beacon from a ship that has this big, gnarly thing attached to its hull. The ship has had an outbreak of a zombie-like virus that is killing the crew. Turns out the big gnarly thing is using humanoid hosts to turn the ship into its egg.

What to do with the ship? What to do with the crew? Do we cure them? Rev up the space chainsaws and start beheading zombies? Nuke the whole thing from orbit? Where did the big nasty bug come from? Are there more?

This could literally turn into a campaign or series of campaigns and the more I think about it the more cool ideas bubble up. There’s only two questions remaining. The first is what system? The second is, do I drop this into an established universe or just run with my own?

These questions and more answered in another article. Game on. Have fun!

Surprise!

Just checking in. Giving more thoughts to rebranding everything completely. Someone gave me food for thought on more Indie RPGs we should all be looking into.

Just when I thought I’d seen it all…

Someone approached me on Twitter today with a handful of RPG’s I wasn’t overly familiar with. Admittedly, a couple of them were variations on d20 system and one was kind of a loose Shadowrun/D20 Modern setting. Still, I was pretty impressed. One of my goals going forward is going to be to brush up on more Indie RPGs.

Also, heading into the new year, I’m looking into a couple of FATE related games. Part of me is really starting to miss running Call of Cthulhu and other modern horror type games, too. I see where there is a FATE Horror toolkit and I happen to have a couple of generic zombie apocalypse games that I like. I’m also interested in possibly creating a sandbox style mecha campaign using FATE or The Mecha Hack.

So Many Groovy Ideas,

And I actually have time to work on some of them. Unlike some of my very wonderfully talented friends on Twitter and Instagram, I have yet to land any sort of meaningful employment. My family isn’t in danger of starving in the street and we’re happy, but I’d love to be getting paid for something I enjoy.

I’ll keep everyone posted on my re-branding thoughts. I’ve been considering moving all of my blogging activities over to my main site, Jeff’s Thoughts I’d be separating my gaming ventures out from my spiritual/Law of Attraction/Ufology/conspiracy/self improvement blog over there. The main advantages are I have a better WordPress plan for that site and more tools at my disposal. Plus, I’ve had some branding ideas that have been running around in my head for 20+ years that I’ve been sitting on.

No, it’s nothing crossing over my two very diverse foci in life. There should always be a healthy balance between one’s gaming activities and one’s other beliefs, I think. I mean, the Ufology/spirituality/conspiracy community refuses to take one seriously if they don’t think I can tell fantasy from reality. The gaming community probably doesn’t want me sounding all positive to the point of preachy, either. And we all know the underlying D&D rule about never mixing real world religions with rpgs. I try not to overtly mash spirituality into my games, either.

Anyway, more to come. Happy gaming into the new year! See you again real soon.

Do I Have to Do it “Their” Way?

If the world was open? If it had its own OGL? If it were free to distribute AND had a good system? Heaven!

Pathfinder Second Edition vs Dungeons & Dragons 5E

Please forgive me. This post is not intended to start an online donnybrook over whose system is best. **Disclaimer:** Play whichever system you like. Decide for yourself what you prefer. Thank you!

Yesterday I was discussing whether or not one should play/run/create content for D&D 5E strictly for rules-as-written or homebrew. Homebrew is awesome! But with 5E being the top dog in the industry right now, it’s also the one most people are playing with/creating material for. I love 5E for this reason.

I used to dog on Pathfinder pretty hard when it started. BUT…

Yeah. I’m guilty of that. I’m sorry family. It’s true. I used to think it was strictly intended for all the Third Edition D&D players that couldn’t handle Fourth Edition. BUT! I came around. Just in time for Pathfinder Second Edition.

Lessons learned, I LOVE Pathfinder 2E! The mechanics are great. The classes are pretty cool. It’s flexible. Paizo learned from their previous edition. The main rulebook is heavy enough to defend my home from burglars… It’s all good. Some day I might do a full review.

There’s another catch with PF2E, though.

If you are playing D&D 5E as written, you’re playing in the default setting of Forgotten Realms. There’s also Eberron, Ravnica, and soon I guess they’re releasing Spelljammer and possibly Planescape. If you go online there are literally hundreds of other campaign worlds and settings along with conversions of older settings. Please don’t panic. There is plenty of room for more. The Open Gaming License literally opened the floodgates for more world building than anyone ever imagined.

Pathfinder 2E, not so much… While Pathfinder Infinite has opened their world to creators, it’s pretty much their world. I don’t mind this, but it doesn’t leave a lot of room for world building. That’s unfortunate. So, yay, I can homebrew PF2E, but then I have to figure out how literally everything translates into PF2-ese. So, yay Golarian.

I will say Starfinder, which is more or less Pathfinder in space, just opened up considerably with the Galaxy Exploration guide. That’s cool. Space is infinite. The Universe is literally infinite and that’s without alternate dimensions. It would be foolhardy to lock players into one star system or one planet for a space game.

I see this happen with other games.

I collect RPGs like mad. I love games. I love mecha and anime games especially. Alas, many of them seem to fall into one of about three categories. 1. They have their own very specific campaign setting/world. Again, yay, but it’s not what I’m looking for. 2. They’re too generic. A lot of games have great mechanics, but just don’t go far enough into what I was looking for in their game. 3. Last, they don’t have any kind of OGL attached. Which means they’re literally the only source of material for that game.

I understand companies having exclusive rights to certain properties. Ask anyone who used to work for T$R or West End Games about Lucasfilm. They’ll probably cringe. Star Wars was especially tough to work with, from what I hear. Ugnaughts anyone? Margret Weis Productions had a deal with Battlestar Galactica RPG. A lot of established properties don’t want people willy-nilly adding to their setting and then publishing it, which thoroughly wrecks the official canon and creates all kinds of plot holes. Seems fair to limit creative access, right?

But why lock an indie game possibly with its own unique system, into a specific setting? Seriously, I would love to work for just about any game company on almost any system. (I have a few disclaimers, but we’ll leave that for another day.) But if the world was open? If it had its own OGL? If it were free to distribute AND had a good system??? Heaven!

I might not exactly love D&D 5E for certain mechanics.

But at least the OGL lets us create our own worlds, classes, characters, and so on with an established system that actually does work pretty darn well. Ironically, PF2E is based on roughly the same mechanics. There are a LOT of d20 based games. At this point, if I’m publishing on DrivethruRPG, my intention is to do something d20 based or a superhero game like ICONS. The only other generic systems I’ve really enjoyed so far have been FATE and Open Legends. Again, I’d have to spend some serious time developing within those systems because there are certain things kinda missing that I’m looking for mechanically. (Again, that’s another discussion.)

I love Paizo’s take on d20. I think the Starfinder/Pathfinder mechanics are well thought out. I think PF2E is loads of fun. I almost taught my kids to play it before D&D 5E. PF2E has not become the runaway train of supplements that its predecessor did. I look forward to their upcoming releases and writing some adventures set in Golarian probably just for fun. Maybe not for publication. Starfinder Infinite material might be a possibility, depending…

I love D&D 5E because I’m building my own very odd, wacky, very fun (hopefully) campaign world. With some help from the Universe, I might even publish it. And I have some “generic” fantasy stuff that I’m again planning for DMsGuild hopefully in the near future. Pathfinder Infinite might be another story. I don’t know yet.

I’m also working on a more solidly constructed portfolio to show off some of my writing talents. In the meantime, if you are interested in hiring me as a writer I am quite available. Heh heh. No seriously! LOL! Please hire me? Heck, if you’re local I’ll even walk your dog or something.

Until next time, take care.

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