Feb 06
[Rec] is highly highly recommended if you like the zombie genre. It’s shaky cam style ala Blair Witch, Cloverfield but in the context of the film it makes sense and I didn’t find it distracting. It’s got a bit of a slow build up but it’s not bad since it involves a seriously attractive actor …
Feb 03
Playtesting and Simulation – It’s important IMPO as you’re designing your ‘engine’ that you play test it at frequent steps along the way and do it thoroughly. This means create characters brand new for each one, using the steps as you’ve written them out. Don’t just assume you know what you mean. Read each step …
Feb 01
Just to offer a few minutes in the mind of someone who’s creating a game system this is what I just emailed to my play group, mainly to clarify the thoughts to myself more than anything. I do that a lot, putting it down as a stream of thought onto ‘paper’ to get a clearer …
Jan 30
The second DRYH Session Notes: One thing that’s still proving tricksy is players fully engaging in the freedom to narrate what’s occurring, to jump into the deep end and letting loose and basically being the GM. But again it’s something comes with time. This session is a continuation of the previous session, the only changes …
Jan 25
How to host a murder This is the rough first draft of the chapter of tips and suggestions for would be directors, aka game masters. I have the feeling it may come off as preachy, definitely opinionated and with a bit of ‘this is the right way to do it’ but I’m not sure that’s …
Jan 24
Cash And Carry The carry mechanic also known as the how much phat l3wt can I carry out of the dungeon… I’ll be honest since roughly 1980, I’ve abstracted weight and limits and capacities for my players to a ‘whatever seems reasonable’ limit. I remember once I had a new player join my DnD session …
Jan 23
Zombie Fiction Autumn by +David Moody Author Site: http://www.djmoody.co.uk/ Rating: An 8 out of 10 on my personal zombie scale. How British zombie fiction differs from American zombie fiction – This is a British author (I’m assuming) and book ergo if you’re familiar with the type, it has fewer pages than American publishers tend to …
Jan 17
Based on comments from my group and other who I broached the question to, I’ve added a ‘semi-random’ skill up mechanic to LCA!. The idea is to cater to the folks who enjoy a little bit of randomness in their character’s path choices as well as the ones who have a definite, “This is what …
Jan 17
Using a Change Log About version .7 or so of LCA! with the bulk of the rough mechanics was done I started a change log document. The changes were getting small enough that it was feasible to note them and as I was starting to forget that I’d changed things due to information glut it …
Jan 16
Don’t Rest Your Head Session 1 report – Part 2 You can find the first part of this session report here – http://www.keyourcars.com/?p=8083 Players: +Laura Dollins +Scott Stone +David Warren Persons of Interest: +Temple Smith +L. Scott Rubin Just to sum up, this was our first gaming session using DRYH. None of us have used …
Jan 16
Random skillups Curious if anyone has an opinion on the pros/cons of a random skill up system. Most systems I’m familiar with, skill gains are done either automatically as you level up or you get character points when you level that you can then spend to level up your skills as you see fit. There …
Jan 15
Session Report Don’t Rest Your Head I ran my first for real session of DRYH or Dont’ Rest Your Head last night. It’s a strong narrative, light mechanics system set in a dark surreal land of horror and scary things that really do live under the bed, things that are all pointy bits and razor …
Jan 13
My first player submission from +Scott Stone for my DRYH campaign tomorrow. My response to the player – Oh but the future loooooves Jimmy. It’s been waiting in the shadows and alleys, biding its time, sharpening its claws for 37 long years, sharpening them to razor edges and needle points, just for this moment…. From …
Jan 13
Don’t Rest Your Head I’m going to be running my first DRYH (by +Fred Hicks ) session tomorrow, my first ‘for realz’ group session rather than playtesting that is. If you’re not familiar with the system, I highly recommend taking a look to see if it fits your gaming needs. Barring technical difficulties it should …
Jan 12
Con games can be both tough and easy. How’s that for a little wish and wash? Let me expand a bit. They’re tough for a couple of bigger reasons – You have a very finite time period to put on your show. You have a hard start and usually a hard end unless you’re the …
Jan 11
Sigh, nothing is more painfully annoying than making a drastic change to a mechanic as far spreading as damage health healing and having to go back and edit the changes everywhere it’s mentioned, every example, every sample character etc. But as a result I as I was scrolling along I did some clean up in …
Jan 08
Charisma as a stat…. Do we really need it? Climbing in the WABAC machine with Mister Peabody and Sherman and checking things out, charisma has been a mostly ignored stat from day one and yet always there. Its kind of like laws for lawmakers. It gets lip service but never really used. Sure back in …
Jan 07
The active defense – To continue my previous post, I think it was my previous post, I’m going to stream of thought, putting things into letters helps solidify them for me. Trivia note: LCA! has a strong tactical leaning. I’m trying to find a happy (for me) middle ground somewhere between Savage Worlds and DnD …
Jan 06
The active defense versus the passive defense. A recent look at the 6d6 core system has me thinking about the differences between active defense and passive defenses in RPG mechanics. The passive defense is the most common in my experience. The attacker (or whatever) typically rolls dice or otherwise generates a random result. This is …
Jan 02
Just wanted to point that including sequences of ‘actual play’ (and note the s on the word sequence) goes a long way toward making your system understandable. Your potential audience hasn’t spent the last year working on your system and know it like the back of their hands. What’s blatantly obvious to you is rife …
