I was able to squeeze in an extra gaming session this week, and decided to join up with Patrick's regular game that he runs with the Teens. One of the Teen's, Teen1 in Patrick's AP reports, is my nephew. In fact some months ago I introduced him and his friends to Patrick when they happened to be at our local games haunt, and as I was the only person who had turned up from the proposed group they joined in with us.
I played for a few weeks, but then couldn't keep up with two regular games nights each week; I've dipped in and out of playing LotFP with Patrick when we were available, and really enjoyed hearing about how they were getting on - or more often getting in to evermore insane situations (usually with some choice dialogue ensuing).
Showing posts with label tabletop. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tabletop. Show all posts
Friday, 28 September 2012
Wednesday, 26 September 2012
Games Night: Another Day in Asp
There's been a fair amount of rain in my part of the world over the last few days, which meant that one of the Dogs couldn't make it to continue sorting out the problems of the Hope Mission. Instead, Patrick volunteered to run a one-shot in the town of Asp for mine and David's characters using Lamentations of the Flame Princess.
I continued with two of my three LotFP characters that I used the last time Patrick ran a one-shot, and David had a character he had used previously. So the party was:
We seemed to interpret this as: kill everything that moves. Patrick gives the option to describe what happens when we kill someone in combat. This lead to ever-increasing descriptions of gore and mayhem, that started with the first guy that we met in the dungeon. His beheading fountained us in blood, and the red that spilled from his comrades soon meant that we were three comrades at arms, running through the dungeon dripping blood everywhere we went.
Patrick: "7! OK, that's enough to kill him, what happens?"
Me: "I jump and force the blade down and right through his chest, skewering his heart!"
Patrick laughs.
Patrick: "6! He's a goner, what happens?"
Me: "I disembowel him, stabbing in and twisting the blade all the way across to the back his spine!"
Patrick laughs, uneasily.
Patrick: "So he hits you for 1, but simultaneously you hit him for 7, he's dead.....What happens?"
Me: "So, his morningstar glances off my armour... And then I move to slash him, but at the last second flick his morningstar up and it smacks him square in his face. It crushes his nose and embeds all the way back to his brain."
Patrick laughs, then stops. Then shakes his head.
We didn't find anything in terms of treasure - Patrick said it was there, XP all over the place in the form of treasure, but we were too busy running from one encounter to the next. We got eight silver pieces in total.
Namco only knows what will happen when I join him for his game with my nephew tomorrow...
I continued with two of my three LotFP characters that I used the last time Patrick ran a one-shot, and David had a character he had used previously. So the party was:
- Charley Shortbread: one-eyed Specialist, Level 2. Comes up with overly complicated plans that get shot down by everyone. He seems to be very much in favour of stabbing first and asking questions later. (me)
- Chastity Glean: first level Fighter. 19 years old, arms are full sleeves of tattoos and scars, short mohawk on top. Her stats are pretty much in the middle, except for STR 16 which gives her a distinct advantage in melee. 8HP don't hurt either. (me)
- Aleph: androgynous female Cleric of Namco. Level 4! David created a table during play to interpret the will of Namco (the God of Idle Pursuits).
We seemed to interpret this as: kill everything that moves. Patrick gives the option to describe what happens when we kill someone in combat. This lead to ever-increasing descriptions of gore and mayhem, that started with the first guy that we met in the dungeon. His beheading fountained us in blood, and the red that spilled from his comrades soon meant that we were three comrades at arms, running through the dungeon dripping blood everywhere we went.
Patrick: "7! OK, that's enough to kill him, what happens?"
Me: "I jump and force the blade down and right through his chest, skewering his heart!"
Patrick laughs.
Patrick: "6! He's a goner, what happens?"
Me: "I disembowel him, stabbing in and twisting the blade all the way across to the back his spine!"
Patrick laughs, uneasily.
Patrick: "So he hits you for 1, but simultaneously you hit him for 7, he's dead.....What happens?"
Me: "So, his morningstar glances off my armour... And then I move to slash him, but at the last second flick his morningstar up and it smacks him square in his face. It crushes his nose and embeds all the way back to his brain."
Patrick laughs, then stops. Then shakes his head.
We didn't find anything in terms of treasure - Patrick said it was there, XP all over the place in the form of treasure, but we were too busy running from one encounter to the next. We got eight silver pieces in total.
Namco only knows what will happen when I join him for his game with my nephew tomorrow...
Tuesday, 11 September 2012
Dogs and Dice and Decisions
It's Games Night! And tonight I start GMing a game of Dogs In The Vineyard, something which I'm really excited about. It's the first time I've played DitV and also the first time (assuming all goes well) that I'll be GMing something which isn't a oneshot. And we have at least one new player joining our merry band.
I think I have my head wrapped around the dice mechanics and the general principles of "Say yes or roll dice" and "Escalate, escalate, escalate!" Other than that, I'm just interested in playing something a bit different. DitV feels like a breath of fresh air. I thought that setting prep would be difficult, but so far it has been really straightforward. Why? Because they focus on people, what they need, what they want and how far they might go if others (or demons!) push them. And it is so much easier to focus on those fundamentals, the inclinations and breaking points. I have a little map (which I have to redraw to get rid of my notes) and I have notes of circumstances for a few towns and their inhabitants, as well as a paragraph each for those I've not fleshed out yet - I want to see what direction my players take things...
I'll be writing a lot about this over the next few weeks. If I ever finish writing about other dice mechanics I've been interested by I might even get around to thinking about the simple but complex dice of DitV. I can't wait to see it in play.
I think I have my head wrapped around the dice mechanics and the general principles of "Say yes or roll dice" and "Escalate, escalate, escalate!" Other than that, I'm just interested in playing something a bit different. DitV feels like a breath of fresh air. I thought that setting prep would be difficult, but so far it has been really straightforward. Why? Because they focus on people, what they need, what they want and how far they might go if others (or demons!) push them. And it is so much easier to focus on those fundamentals, the inclinations and breaking points. I have a little map (which I have to redraw to get rid of my notes) and I have notes of circumstances for a few towns and their inhabitants, as well as a paragraph each for those I've not fleshed out yet - I want to see what direction my players take things...
I'll be writing a lot about this over the next few weeks. If I ever finish writing about other dice mechanics I've been interested by I might even get around to thinking about the simple but complex dice of DitV. I can't wait to see it in play.
Monday, 20 August 2012
Human Again
Two weeks ago my slug-man magic user Eki Ulele was killed in our regular OD&D game. noisms has hinted a little that there may be ways to raise characters from the dead in Yoon-Suin but has given no actual hints about how that might be done. That means that tomorrow I will be statting up a new character, and I've decided that this time he's going to be human.
And he won't be a magic user: after five sessions of getting knocked out and several where I've had spells that were often not useful - possibly, this was down to me not finding a use for them - I've decided that it might be best to go down the Fighter route. Our party already has a Cleric and a Magic-User, so I've decided that someone a bit hands on, covered in armour might be good. Playing as a Thief is tempting, but I'm not sure what the benefits of being a thief are in OD&D.
So I think I will be a Human Fighter. And I might play with the George Costanza path to decision-making: whatever my first inclination is, I will do the opposite. A pacifist fighter... Hmm. Maybe not.
And he won't be a magic user: after five sessions of getting knocked out and several where I've had spells that were often not useful - possibly, this was down to me not finding a use for them - I've decided that it might be best to go down the Fighter route. Our party already has a Cleric and a Magic-User, so I've decided that someone a bit hands on, covered in armour might be good. Playing as a Thief is tempting, but I'm not sure what the benefits of being a thief are in OD&D.
So I think I will be a Human Fighter. And I might play with the George Costanza path to decision-making: whatever my first inclination is, I will do the opposite. A pacifist fighter... Hmm. Maybe not.
Sunday, 17 June 2012
Work Work Work
Gets in the way of everything. But hopefully means that sooner or later I can have a break. Next weekend I'm having the guys around so that we can play games. It might be Carcassonne, might be Munchkin, it might even be noisms' DMing his Yoon-Suin setting.
Something to look forward to after another busy week of work.
Something to look forward to after another busy week of work.
Thursday, 7 June 2012
Games Night: LotFP/Isle of the Unknown
I've missed talking about our regular Lamentations of the Flame Princess game for a couple of weeks. Last time on the Isle of the Unknown, Patrick was DMing us through a dungeon underneath an old keep. We had killed some Cthulu-worshippers, some giant bats and avoided some traps along the way. All was well with the world, and I was enjoying playing my new cleric, Priam, servant of the powerful god Venn. Charley/Henry Shortbread, the specialist, had disappeared into the undergrowth, and Priam had just happened to walk along and find the party as they were on their way to the keep.
Patrick has a nice house rule when it comes to magic; as with many D&D type games, you have your spell slots, but you can also try to cast any spell appropriate to your level, so long as you roll for success. Success is determined according to the Apocalypse World success rules: 2d6 plus or minus any modifier, a 10+ gives you what you want (the successful spell), a 7-9 gives you success plus a roll on a "something bad happens" table and a 6 or less just gives you the roll on the "something bad happens" table.
The Bless cleric spell/prayer in LotFP, as understood by me, means that you get d6+level points to spend/declare for future rolls. So having points like that means I can spend points to attack, to evade, for WIS checks - or even, to try and get future spells using Patrick's magic house rule. So if I get a good Bless result early on, then I have points in reserve for the night. I just needed to make that first AW-style roll.
It worked last week. It didn't last night.
I roll a 9, so get my blessing, but immediately have to spend the points to get favour from Venn again in order to cast cure light wounds on myself. Why? Displeased with my constant requests, Venn placed a small dog in my abdomenal cavity. Yes, that's right: A SMALL DOG. Not warts or boils on my face, or a limp, or blindness. A SMALL DOG. Luckily I was able to perform a caesarean on myself and have enough HP to then invoke cure light wounds (using many of the bless points that I just got).
Phew. I was up on the deal I guess. The dog was out, I had more HP than I had had before, I had some bless points left, and a dog that (rolls for loyalty)... hates me.
Lesson learned: don't try to game your deity.
Despite having the highest wisdom in the group I failed four rolls in a row - which is improbable enough - but then for the first three rolls I rolled a 16 each time. A one in eight thousand chance.
The small dog, Priestly, was eaten by a giant moth, we had our first big toe-to-toe battle with some giant Amber Scarabs (was touch and go), escaped from a crazy trap, got suspicious about the Bandit/Cleric who put us up to the job in the first place and the younglings were shouting at each other so much at one point that I passed Patrick the encounter die and said "You may as well just roll."
I can't make it for a couple of weeks, so have asked Patrick if my character can try to slip out of the dungeon (so that he isn't killed in the background when the others do something incredibly reckless). We'll see what happens. I'm enjoying playing a cleric much more than playing a specialist, so am hoping that I'll be able to get him back into play at some point soon.
Patrick has a nice house rule when it comes to magic; as with many D&D type games, you have your spell slots, but you can also try to cast any spell appropriate to your level, so long as you roll for success. Success is determined according to the Apocalypse World success rules: 2d6 plus or minus any modifier, a 10+ gives you what you want (the successful spell), a 7-9 gives you success plus a roll on a "something bad happens" table and a 6 or less just gives you the roll on the "something bad happens" table.
The Bless cleric spell/prayer in LotFP, as understood by me, means that you get d6+level points to spend/declare for future rolls. So having points like that means I can spend points to attack, to evade, for WIS checks - or even, to try and get future spells using Patrick's magic house rule. So if I get a good Bless result early on, then I have points in reserve for the night. I just needed to make that first AW-style roll.
It worked last week. It didn't last night.
I roll a 9, so get my blessing, but immediately have to spend the points to get favour from Venn again in order to cast cure light wounds on myself. Why? Displeased with my constant requests, Venn placed a small dog in my abdomenal cavity. Yes, that's right: A SMALL DOG. Not warts or boils on my face, or a limp, or blindness. A SMALL DOG. Luckily I was able to perform a caesarean on myself and have enough HP to then invoke cure light wounds (using many of the bless points that I just got).
Phew. I was up on the deal I guess. The dog was out, I had more HP than I had had before, I had some bless points left, and a dog that (rolls for loyalty)... hates me.
Lesson learned: don't try to game your deity.
Despite having the highest wisdom in the group I failed four rolls in a row - which is improbable enough - but then for the first three rolls I rolled a 16 each time. A one in eight thousand chance.
The small dog, Priestly, was eaten by a giant moth, we had our first big toe-to-toe battle with some giant Amber Scarabs (was touch and go), escaped from a crazy trap, got suspicious about the Bandit/Cleric who put us up to the job in the first place and the younglings were shouting at each other so much at one point that I passed Patrick the encounter die and said "You may as well just roll."
I can't make it for a couple of weeks, so have asked Patrick if my character can try to slip out of the dungeon (so that he isn't killed in the background when the others do something incredibly reckless). We'll see what happens. I'm enjoying playing a cleric much more than playing a specialist, so am hoping that I'll be able to get him back into play at some point soon.
Thursday, 24 May 2012
Tabletop (the web show)
A very short and simple post today; I just wanted to share the third installment of Tabletop, a new fortnightly series of videos with Wil Wheaton and friends playing geeky and nerdy games. I've not played any of them so far, although I've heard of a few. After the second episode I really want to now play Settlers of Catan, and some of the short games featured in this video look great too.
Now all I have to do is get them and find someone to play them with... I think I'm going to get Carcassonne for Android so that I can play against AI.
Now all I have to do is get them and find someone to play them with... I think I'm going to get Carcassonne for Android so that I can play against AI.
Monday, 14 May 2012
Diaspora: Character Generation
There's a running joke in our gaming group that all of my characters are fundamentally the same person: this is perhaps a not uncommon occurence in gaming groups. noisms provides a helpful summary of things that my characters have been involved in (and I follow with a rebuttal of some of them). Given the crazy worlds that my characters are in, their actions seem fairly sane and logical to me!
However, when setting up my character for Diaspora it occured to me that it might be good to steer things from the start so that the character has a different direction, a lifepath that might take things beyond what is typical for my characters. Adding details of this in yesterday's post would have made the post much too long.
I like the way that Diaspora sets up characters; noisms ran it really well, leading us through each part. Essentially, you detail five phases of the character's life up to the present, and from each phase you get two Aspects, defining features, details, locations, weapons or characteristics for the character. We didn't get to any proper play yesterday, but we were told that you essentially invoke these Aspects when relevant in play to help influence the outcome of situations.
So this is what I wrote for my character, Silence Arizona.
Thursday, 10 May 2012
Games Night: Isle of the Unknown
Two weeks ago my brave and Lawful Specialist Charley Shortbread was almost killed by a brutal cut from a lizardman chief; during the session that I was absent from last week he was mostly perched on top of a cart recovering.
So we return to the Isle of the Unknown, and find ourselves meeting up with another shipwreck victim (noisms joined the game), and then proceed to carry out a plan that had been set in motion in our absence: to dispose of some war chimps that had acted as bodyguard to a magically locked safe, and then take the safe to the local castle.
There was some potential crazy background deals going on, but that all went south when we disposed of the bodies at a local churchyard. There was a lot of intra-party disagreement on how to proceed, an NPC civilian got killed (ironically, they were the town's healer, so no recovery at the end of the session!), and both Charley Shortbread and Glister (noisms' PC) had to leave town via the river, then come back around to the main gate, and pretend to be travellers, shipwreck victims, struggling through the night and seeking sanctuary.
Of course, this only worked so far, as Charley was known by the gatesmen (in my absence he had been seen around with our other PC, a swashbuckling and incredibly lucky fighter called Klaus); but the Force was with us, and the gatesmen and everyone else that I met believed that they had met my now absent IDENTICAL TWIN BROTHER. From that point on, goodbye Charley, hello Henry. Henry Shortbread.
Cut forward to more disagreements in a dungeon beneath the town, some thief slaughter, Klaus summoning his demon dogs and then falling into a pit trap through carelessness, and Henry and Glister being seriously wounded. We ended the session with just enough good fortune to get XP, some healing, some respect from the towns-people and an idea that all is not as it seems in this strange town... And the head of the castle guards is very suspicious of us (and rightly so).
Memorable Moments from Games Night
Klaus: No-one's going to miss an old woman. Old women go missing all the time.
Charley/Henry: 1HP equates to losing an eye?!
Patrick (DM): I'm gonna be the hippy art teacher DM...
And finally, a moment that perhaps you had to be there for, but which caused a lot of laughter around the table. Remember, we play this in a gaming cafe, i.e., in public. Glister was on -1HP, and I asked Patrick if I could perform any kind of first aid or stabilisation. On the fly (I think) he said that I could, if I described my actions and then shouted "Don't you die on me man!" in a cinematic style.
Me: Really? Like I'm McCoy or something?
Patrick: Yeah, "don't you die on me man!"
Me: OK. So I do this and that and pound Glister on the chest and shout "don't you die on me man!"
Patrick: ...Louder.
Me: What?
Patrick: Louder.
Me: Don't you die on me man!
Patrick: Do you want to save him or not?
noisms: Yeah, do you want to save me or not?!
Me: Sigh.
Patrick: He's not looking good...
Me: DON'T YOU DIE ON ME MAN!
Patrick: Hmmmm-
Me: DON'T YOU DIE ON ME MAN!!!!!!
(Patrick and noisms are both, of course, laughing their asses off by now)
Patrick: ...So, Glister wakes up...
So we return to the Isle of the Unknown, and find ourselves meeting up with another shipwreck victim (noisms joined the game), and then proceed to carry out a plan that had been set in motion in our absence: to dispose of some war chimps that had acted as bodyguard to a magically locked safe, and then take the safe to the local castle.
There was some potential crazy background deals going on, but that all went south when we disposed of the bodies at a local churchyard. There was a lot of intra-party disagreement on how to proceed, an NPC civilian got killed (ironically, they were the town's healer, so no recovery at the end of the session!), and both Charley Shortbread and Glister (noisms' PC) had to leave town via the river, then come back around to the main gate, and pretend to be travellers, shipwreck victims, struggling through the night and seeking sanctuary.
Of course, this only worked so far, as Charley was known by the gatesmen (in my absence he had been seen around with our other PC, a swashbuckling and incredibly lucky fighter called Klaus); but the Force was with us, and the gatesmen and everyone else that I met believed that they had met my now absent IDENTICAL TWIN BROTHER. From that point on, goodbye Charley, hello Henry. Henry Shortbread.
Cut forward to more disagreements in a dungeon beneath the town, some thief slaughter, Klaus summoning his demon dogs and then falling into a pit trap through carelessness, and Henry and Glister being seriously wounded. We ended the session with just enough good fortune to get XP, some healing, some respect from the towns-people and an idea that all is not as it seems in this strange town... And the head of the castle guards is very suspicious of us (and rightly so).
Memorable Moments from Games Night
Klaus: No-one's going to miss an old woman. Old women go missing all the time.
Charley/Henry: 1HP equates to losing an eye?!
Patrick (DM): I'm gonna be the hippy art teacher DM...
And finally, a moment that perhaps you had to be there for, but which caused a lot of laughter around the table. Remember, we play this in a gaming cafe, i.e., in public. Glister was on -1HP, and I asked Patrick if I could perform any kind of first aid or stabilisation. On the fly (I think) he said that I could, if I described my actions and then shouted "Don't you die on me man!" in a cinematic style.
Me: Really? Like I'm McCoy or something?
Patrick: Yeah, "don't you die on me man!"
Me: OK. So I do this and that and pound Glister on the chest and shout "don't you die on me man!"
Patrick: ...Louder.
Me: What?
Patrick: Louder.
Me: Don't you die on me man!
Patrick: Do you want to save him or not?
noisms: Yeah, do you want to save me or not?!
Me: Sigh.
Patrick: He's not looking good...
Me: DON'T YOU DIE ON ME MAN!
Patrick: Hmmmm-
Me: DON'T YOU DIE ON ME MAN!!!!!!
(Patrick and noisms are both, of course, laughing their asses off by now)
Patrick: ...So, Glister wakes up...
Tuesday, 8 May 2012
Upcoming
I have a Games Night and a Games Day to look forward to in the next week. I had to take a week off because of work - and worse luck, it seems like I might have to do the same next week - but tomorrow I have another session of Lamentations of the Flame Princess - after the great session a few weeks ago - and then on Saturday there's a group of us getting together to have a full day of Diaspora.
I'm interested to see where LotFP ended up during my absence (as you might recall, previously I was at death's door, and barely hanging on after being slashed open by a big lizard man). I've heard bits and pieces from a play summary; I wonder how quickly Charley Shortbread can get back in to things?
Diaspora is going to be interesting too. I know next to nothing about it, the keywords in my mind are space opera, Fudge dice, big universe, space travel. All of which combines to make me want to play it on Saturday!
I'm interested to see where LotFP ended up during my absence (as you might recall, previously I was at death's door, and barely hanging on after being slashed open by a big lizard man). I've heard bits and pieces from a play summary; I wonder how quickly Charley Shortbread can get back in to things?
Diaspora is going to be interesting too. I know next to nothing about it, the keywords in my mind are space opera, Fudge dice, big universe, space travel. All of which combines to make me want to play it on Saturday!
Tuesday, 1 May 2012
Game Idea: Mystery Novel
This is a sketch of an idea: if anyone knows of an already existing game like this then please let me know, I want to play it!
A Microscope/Cluedo hybrid game. Together the players work to simultaneously create and uncover an Agatha Christie style murder. I'm really thinking of the way that information is presented, uncovered and connections made, a little like a Poirot story.
Perhaps the following elements could be used in some way:
A Microscope/Cluedo hybrid game. Together the players work to simultaneously create and uncover an Agatha Christie style murder. I'm really thinking of the way that information is presented, uncovered and connections made, a little like a Poirot story.
Perhaps the following elements could be used in some way:
- Every turn a player draws a card and Oracle-style this gives a provocation as to a clue or to the investigation. Or random tables could help populate a setting with 1920s/1930s upper class characters with murder in mind, and also introduce other plot elements, objects or artifacts.
- Microscope-style event placing leads to finding out what happened - or what people think they saw happening - with the timeline being populated by only scenes (no events or periods).
- There could be a rough positioning of scenes in to three periods perhaps, "Before the Murder", "During the Murder", "The Investigation."
- One feature of Poirot novels is the fact that he is the only detective (save for Chief Inspector Japp, who invariably has the wrong end of the stick). Perhaps the GM could be the detective - in that sense determining the focus at times to allow the other players reign to be characters, bring to light evidence or lay red herrings.
- Each player could have their own little playbook of random tables that is distinct from the others.
- Rotating GMship could occur between games to allow players to take turns being "the Detective" and being "the Suspects."
Friday, 27 April 2012
Kickstarted
I love Kickstarter. I think that the model for supporting creative endeavours is great. I've supported a few projects since I really got taken with the concept last autumn, and two of them so far have been tabletop games. These games have both been funded now, and I'm waiting on the rewards. While I wait, let me share them with you!
Avarice Industries - project link - homepage
I really liked the concept of this, of industrial espionage, corporate villains and being able to manufacture anything that you can dream of. Sounds a little bit vague, right? Reading a sample of actual play clinched it for me and helped me to stump up the cash:
Mobile Frame Zero: Rapid Attack - project link - homepage (eventually, just a holding pattern for now)
This one instantly appealed to me, partly because of the Vincent Baker connection, but mostly because you build mechs out of Lego and then fight other people. I mean, how cool is that??? It'll take me a little longer to get going with this, partly because it's not as simple as printing off some character sheets (buying Lego pieces and building mechs will take time), but it will be worth it I am sure. The game is based on Mechaton, which I already have - so in principle I could be giving that a go now - but is expanded from that with a whole setting and added rules. I have a dream that by the year's end I'll have had some people over for the afternoon, some pizza and some robot-destroying war action.
Honourary mention for Everything is Dolphins, which I almost supported and then forgot what day it was finishing. D'oh!
Avarice Industries - project link - homepage
I really liked the concept of this, of industrial espionage, corporate villains and being able to manufacture anything that you can dream of. Sounds a little bit vague, right? Reading a sample of actual play clinched it for me and helped me to stump up the cash:
Tasha: She doesn’t have to be home for us to take back what’s rightfully ours. (Bridget, I reach into one of the many pockets on my tiered skirt and pull out my auto-pick.)It sounded like it would be right up my street (and that of the people I play with) in terms of providing opportunities to think really outside of the box. My rules pdf could arrive any time in the next week or so!
Luke: (Hah. I still love your “Skirt of Many Pockets.” I also still can’t believe you fit a crowbar in one of those things.)
Tasha: (It’s easy when each pocket is really a pocket dimension. I paid out of my nose for it though.)
...
Nelson: Oh come on! Everyone on this floor is going to hear a gunshot! Do you really want to pay off the police YET AGAIN?
Luke: (I pull out my ballpoint pen.)
Nelson: Oh… well… um… how’s a pen going to help us out?
Luke: (I take the pen and ruthlessly jam it into the lock.)
Bridget (GM): ….really?
Mobile Frame Zero: Rapid Attack - project link - homepage (eventually, just a holding pattern for now)
This one instantly appealed to me, partly because of the Vincent Baker connection, but mostly because you build mechs out of Lego and then fight other people. I mean, how cool is that??? It'll take me a little longer to get going with this, partly because it's not as simple as printing off some character sheets (buying Lego pieces and building mechs will take time), but it will be worth it I am sure. The game is based on Mechaton, which I already have - so in principle I could be giving that a go now - but is expanded from that with a whole setting and added rules. I have a dream that by the year's end I'll have had some people over for the afternoon, some pizza and some robot-destroying war action.
Honourary mention for Everything is Dolphins, which I almost supported and then forgot what day it was finishing. D'oh!
Monday, 23 April 2012
Games Night: To The Stars/IAWA
Before I went on holiday I GMed a hacked together version of In A Wicked Age set within the shared game universe that our gaming group have put together, To The Stars. The setting for all of this is Zero Point Way Station, a giant space habitat that sits right at the very edge of the solar system in the Oort Cloud. While I didn't have time to write this up two weeks ago and post about it, I did make plenty of notes on my phone the next day while I was waiting for my flight to Spain.
After running In A Wicked Age previously, I knew that I had to think about preparation a little more. In that respect, I think that I did well by producing a list of names (mostly populated by the names of space scientists via Wikipedia), and also by manually writing out the six combinations of NPC form dice, just to make things neater.
The Oracle for the game was something that the four people in our regular group put together, each of us taking a suit and writing thirteen game seeds. It was a really great set of things, and there were so many provocative images and ideas that I could see it really being quite a valuable little resource. I might ask the others and see what they think about me putting a simple pdf up. For the purposes of that particular session we decided to fudge things ever so slightly to make sure that we used one card from each person's suit.
The four seeds were
It's safe to say that nothing happened as any of us planned. PCs seemed perpetually at loggerheads with each other. I think that at times I was too vague with foreshadowing, and at others I gave descriptions that I thought were really clear, but which clearly (after the fact) weren't. Still, second time GMing and all that!
Two things: first, in the final moments of gameplay all three players finally got on to the "Owe" list for the game, which means that all three of them could potentially come back as characters in a future game of Tales From Zero Point (he calls it, not having a better name in mind). This was interesting, as it was something which didn't come up at all in the first game of In A Wicked Age that I ran; it seemed like the PCs were rolling against lower dice throughout, until the very end.
Secondly, while we all had a much better handle on the dice mechanic for resolving things this time, it also felt at times like the mechanic was a bit hit-and-miss. That's not to say that some intriguing stuff didn't happen with the dice-leading-to-story aspect of things. I guess there were two areas where it didn't feel quite right. In the third round of rolling the player with the high roll automatically wins. I can understand there needing to be some kind of cutoff point, but in some cases this felt a bit flat.
Another thing was there not seeming to be a good way of rolling for things which were not due to interaction between characters. If a PC is trying to stab someone, that's a roll of (say) with violence and for myself against (say) NPC self-protection. If a PC is trying to use their knife to pick a lock... What do you do? Do you always let them have it, make them roll some way, flip a coin, have "environment dice" that they are rolling against? What works best? More importantly, what would be simple, clear and consistent?
All-in-all, a great session; I'm looking forward to the next time that I can GM something, and hope that we get back to Tales From Zero Point at some point in the not too distant future. I'm still noodling on various things related to the maths and probabilities of the dice mechanic of In A Wicked Age. When working on it before my holiday some results jumped out at me, so I'm hoping that I can take those and forge on with getting some numbers for the maths side of the blog.
After running In A Wicked Age previously, I knew that I had to think about preparation a little more. In that respect, I think that I did well by producing a list of names (mostly populated by the names of space scientists via Wikipedia), and also by manually writing out the six combinations of NPC form dice, just to make things neater.
The Oracle for the game was something that the four people in our regular group put together, each of us taking a suit and writing thirteen game seeds. It was a really great set of things, and there were so many provocative images and ideas that I could see it really being quite a valuable little resource. I might ask the others and see what they think about me putting a simple pdf up. For the purposes of that particular session we decided to fudge things ever so slightly to make sure that we used one card from each person's suit.
The four seeds were
- A brave rogue, dared by friends to attempt the circumnavigation of the station.
- A gardener tends megafauna in enclosed biomes under the light from an artificial sun.
- Four old men plotting abduction.
- News of a predator stalking the Undercyst reaches a princeling looking for a challenge.
- Hyatt-Wang, a two-headed philosopher trying to keep knowledge secret;
- Krupp, an old man plotting to kidnap Hyatt-Wang with three other old men;
- Janus, a lovable rogue who is trying to circumnavigate Zero Point;
It's safe to say that nothing happened as any of us planned. PCs seemed perpetually at loggerheads with each other. I think that at times I was too vague with foreshadowing, and at others I gave descriptions that I thought were really clear, but which clearly (after the fact) weren't. Still, second time GMing and all that!
Two things: first, in the final moments of gameplay all three players finally got on to the "Owe" list for the game, which means that all three of them could potentially come back as characters in a future game of Tales From Zero Point (he calls it, not having a better name in mind). This was interesting, as it was something which didn't come up at all in the first game of In A Wicked Age that I ran; it seemed like the PCs were rolling against lower dice throughout, until the very end.
Secondly, while we all had a much better handle on the dice mechanic for resolving things this time, it also felt at times like the mechanic was a bit hit-and-miss. That's not to say that some intriguing stuff didn't happen with the dice-leading-to-story aspect of things. I guess there were two areas where it didn't feel quite right. In the third round of rolling the player with the high roll automatically wins. I can understand there needing to be some kind of cutoff point, but in some cases this felt a bit flat.
Another thing was there not seeming to be a good way of rolling for things which were not due to interaction between characters. If a PC is trying to stab someone, that's a roll of (say) with violence and for myself against (say) NPC self-protection. If a PC is trying to use their knife to pick a lock... What do you do? Do you always let them have it, make them roll some way, flip a coin, have "environment dice" that they are rolling against? What works best? More importantly, what would be simple, clear and consistent?
All-in-all, a great session; I'm looking forward to the next time that I can GM something, and hope that we get back to Tales From Zero Point at some point in the not too distant future. I'm still noodling on various things related to the maths and probabilities of the dice mechanic of In A Wicked Age. When working on it before my holiday some results jumped out at me, so I'm hoping that I can take those and forge on with getting some numbers for the maths side of the blog.
Wednesday, 4 April 2012
Games Night: GHOST/ECHO
noisms has already beat me to writing about games night, where we played GHOST/ECHO. GHOST/ECHO is really stripped down, which is pretty freeing I think. We were using it as part of our shared universe that we generated with Microscope, and were playing it as a one-shot in just one of the events that we had determined.
I really liked the concept of the "Ghost World" that we came up with ultimately: a globally persistent augmented reality that had been partially corrupted, somehow infected and then abandoned. People still went there (we went in to look at a dead letter drop) and it was safe from snooping because any sane person would stay out, lest whatever does exist in there should hunt you down. Quite a chilling place. I'd be interested in playing another round of something where that was a part of proceedings.
The dice mechanic for GHOST/ECHO works like this: in any situation where you roll dice, you have your Goal and a possible Danger - kill someone and take damage, hack someone's brain and suffer neural feedback, etc. You roll two d6s, high is good, and then you choose where you assign each die: so if you roll two 6s then you have your goal and avoid the danger.
But say you are in a knife fight with a street-thief: you roll your dice, and get a 6 and a 2. What do you do? Do you stab the guy in the throat (6) but suffer an injury yourself (2), or do you fumble shivving the guy (2) but manage to dodge his blade (6)? It's an interesting mechanism, almost like compounding the "what do you do?" of Apocalypse World - the GM asks you "what do you do?" to state your intentions, but also "what do you do?" when you get the result of a roll. This is a pretty neat mechanic, and means that you can avoid stats and everything. It's not about how strong you are, how tough you are or how dexterous.
Another great thing from the table last night: Patrick, at the start of the game gave us ten syllables to describe the equipment that our characters have. I will have to remember that for future games.
Next Games Night: a story from Zero Point Way Station, another one-shot, generated by an In A Wicked Age style Oracle. And I'm GMing!
'Blueprints' for Zero Point Way Station stolen by spiesGHOST/ECHO works by giving provocative words - names for PCs like Coil, Demon, Grip, names for places like Heartbreak Square, Echo Park, and names for 'Wraiths' (enemies) like Dogs, Spiders, Hawks - as jumping on points, and a really simple but deep dice mechanic (more on that in a moment). The names really worked well as the provocations for an interesting world, that just kept building up around us. We "knew" some things already, there was a hint of what kind of tech level the world was at (from our Microscope play), and the rest just came along as we encountered it.
I really liked the concept of the "Ghost World" that we came up with ultimately: a globally persistent augmented reality that had been partially corrupted, somehow infected and then abandoned. People still went there (we went in to look at a dead letter drop) and it was safe from snooping because any sane person would stay out, lest whatever does exist in there should hunt you down. Quite a chilling place. I'd be interested in playing another round of something where that was a part of proceedings.
The dice mechanic for GHOST/ECHO works like this: in any situation where you roll dice, you have your Goal and a possible Danger - kill someone and take damage, hack someone's brain and suffer neural feedback, etc. You roll two d6s, high is good, and then you choose where you assign each die: so if you roll two 6s then you have your goal and avoid the danger.
But say you are in a knife fight with a street-thief: you roll your dice, and get a 6 and a 2. What do you do? Do you stab the guy in the throat (6) but suffer an injury yourself (2), or do you fumble shivving the guy (2) but manage to dodge his blade (6)? It's an interesting mechanism, almost like compounding the "what do you do?" of Apocalypse World - the GM asks you "what do you do?" to state your intentions, but also "what do you do?" when you get the result of a roll. This is a pretty neat mechanic, and means that you can avoid stats and everything. It's not about how strong you are, how tough you are or how dexterous.
Another great thing from the table last night: Patrick, at the start of the game gave us ten syllables to describe the equipment that our characters have. I will have to remember that for future games.
Next Games Night: a story from Zero Point Way Station, another one-shot, generated by an In A Wicked Age style Oracle. And I'm GMing!
Monday, 2 April 2012
Two Game Ideas
These are just the seeds of things that I was thinking about over the weekend. Maybe there is something interesting in these; maybe not. I am not sure where they might lead, I'm just trying to capture them somewhere.
Smiley Faces
Law enforcement in a dystopian future where everyone is supposed to be happy. What if there was crime? What crime would people commit? Who might criminals be? What would they gain? And what would law enforcement professionals be like?
I see this as an Oracle-starting game, it's all about the storytelling, filling in the blanks from both players and GM. The dice mechanic should be there to add some spice to things, so that events can go badly sometimes. In principle, I want to see other ways of negotiation dice/player negotiation to resolve things.
There might be a system out there already which would just natively support this.
Starts on a Spaceship
Make it as big or as small as you like. The players are senior crew. What are their positions? What are their responsibilities? (perhaps they don't have a command structure in the same way that, say, Starfleet does)
After twenty minutes of routine shipboard stuff, minor engineering stuff, maybe crew command decisions, the ship is hit by something. Something big. What do you do?
Does the ship crash? Does it reach that small planetoid? The captain is dead. ("HE'S DEAD JIM!") What do you do?
The ship reaches the moon, most of the crew are dead. The engines are fused metal and crystals. Scans of the planet were strange. Possible signs of native intelligence. What do you do?
The ship doesn't reach the moon, and is adrift, venting atmosphere. The captain is dead. ("I'M A DOCTOR NOT THE MESSIAH!") What do you do?
There are strange noises/scans coming from the section of the ship that was hit/Lt Redshirt didn't come back from the perimeter patrol. What do you do?
More importantly: how are you going to get back to civilisation?
The second hints at possible undiscovered life etc, but perhaps it might be interesting to do it as an ultra-hard sci-fi, where it is all about the decisions and consequences of humans in the void.
Smiley Faces
Law enforcement in a dystopian future where everyone is supposed to be happy. What if there was crime? What crime would people commit? Who might criminals be? What would they gain? And what would law enforcement professionals be like?
I see this as an Oracle-starting game, it's all about the storytelling, filling in the blanks from both players and GM. The dice mechanic should be there to add some spice to things, so that events can go badly sometimes. In principle, I want to see other ways of negotiation dice/player negotiation to resolve things.
There might be a system out there already which would just natively support this.
Starts on a Spaceship
Make it as big or as small as you like. The players are senior crew. What are their positions? What are their responsibilities? (perhaps they don't have a command structure in the same way that, say, Starfleet does)
After twenty minutes of routine shipboard stuff, minor engineering stuff, maybe crew command decisions, the ship is hit by something. Something big. What do you do?
Does the ship crash? Does it reach that small planetoid? The captain is dead. ("HE'S DEAD JIM!") What do you do?
The ship reaches the moon, most of the crew are dead. The engines are fused metal and crystals. Scans of the planet were strange. Possible signs of native intelligence. What do you do?
The ship doesn't reach the moon, and is adrift, venting atmosphere. The captain is dead. ("I'M A DOCTOR NOT THE MESSIAH!") What do you do?
There are strange noises/scans coming from the section of the ship that was hit/Lt Redshirt didn't come back from the perimeter patrol. What do you do?
More importantly: how are you going to get back to civilisation?
The second hints at possible undiscovered life etc, but perhaps it might be interesting to do it as an ultra-hard sci-fi, where it is all about the decisions and consequences of humans in the void.
Friday, 30 March 2012
The "From Dusk Till Dawn" Effect
(this could, I suppose, also be called the "Psycho" Effect)
(inevitably, spoiler alert)
When I was in my teens I watched From Dusk Till Dawn with my mum and dad. We put the video on reasonably late in the evening; by-and-by the film advanced as far as Clooney and Tarantino crossing the border and arriving at the Titty Twister. It was at this point, as it was late, that I went to bed. I hadn't seen the film before, but knew (roughly) what it was about.
What I did not know was that my parents knew nothing about the film. Nothing at all. My nan had cable TV and we did not, and she taped films indiscriminately, giving us a dozen films a month to watch (and then return, she liked to collect them). All my parents knew, at the point that I went to bed, was that Clooney and Tarantino were ruthless criminals, not averse to murder, kidnapping, robbery etc, and that they had arrived at a bar in the Mexican desert. They knew nothing of the plot that was to unfold from that point.
You can imagine their shock (and what they said to me the next day, as it had been my suggestion originally that we watch it).
I was musing on this today, and wondering about how this kind of shock might be put into a role-playing game. I'm not talking about a game of Cyberpunk where a bank job suddenly goes wrong: while you might have hoped that it would go well, it's not inconceivable that it would go wrong. I'm not talking about a game of D&D, where the sorcerer says, "I am your father."
My thought is about genuinely surprising players:
I have no idea if this would work - and having posted it online, I don't know if any future players might suspect I was going to do it if I got the chance to run a longer campaign. I just have this idea that if it was presented well it could provide a huge but satisfying narrative twist to a campaign.
Enough of me though: anyone out there got any thoughts/comments/ideas?
(inevitably, spoiler alert)
When I was in my teens I watched From Dusk Till Dawn with my mum and dad. We put the video on reasonably late in the evening; by-and-by the film advanced as far as Clooney and Tarantino crossing the border and arriving at the Titty Twister. It was at this point, as it was late, that I went to bed. I hadn't seen the film before, but knew (roughly) what it was about.
What I did not know was that my parents knew nothing about the film. Nothing at all. My nan had cable TV and we did not, and she taped films indiscriminately, giving us a dozen films a month to watch (and then return, she liked to collect them). All my parents knew, at the point that I went to bed, was that Clooney and Tarantino were ruthless criminals, not averse to murder, kidnapping, robbery etc, and that they had arrived at a bar in the Mexican desert. They knew nothing of the plot that was to unfold from that point.
You can imagine their shock (and what they said to me the next day, as it had been my suggestion originally that we watch it).
I was musing on this today, and wondering about how this kind of shock might be put into a role-playing game. I'm not talking about a game of Cyberpunk where a bank job suddenly goes wrong: while you might have hoped that it would go well, it's not inconceivable that it would go wrong. I'm not talking about a game of D&D, where the sorcerer says, "I am your father."
My thought is about genuinely surprising players:
- vampires suddenly showing up in a bar, in a world which to all intents and purposes is completely normal;
- a player taking a shower, suddenly and brutally murdered, after successfully rolling persuade and evade so many times talking to cops and used-car salesmen, travelling across country with ill-gotten loot;
- a group of players suddenly discovering that one of their own has been the secret villain all along, a la Keyser Soze.
I have no idea if this would work - and having posted it online, I don't know if any future players might suspect I was going to do it if I got the chance to run a longer campaign. I just have this idea that if it was presented well it could provide a huge but satisfying narrative twist to a campaign.
Enough of me though: anyone out there got any thoughts/comments/ideas?
Monday, 26 March 2012
Someone I Was
Chaplain was my Gunlugger in Apocalypse World. In other games he might almost be a Solo, or a Warrior. I think that in Apocalypse World's messed up future he might even be close to a Paladin (if you really, really squint). Maybe I am only seeing what I want to see. He was a damage sponge, things just didn't connect properly. He always tried to do the right thing, but according to his own rules of what was right.
Chaplain was the first character I ever created in a tabletop RPG (I leave aside a Mutants and Masterminds game noisms and I tried to play over Facebook messages). His first action in play was to draw a gun on someone who was beating up someone else in the street. It felt right, the more that I went on, that he was just trying to do the right thing - not necessarily for himself (to profit by things) but to ultimately keep other people safe. And most of the time, him being a Gunlugger, that meant having to do something violent. When he came into contact with a Hive parasite he argued his way out of being killed, put on a pair of gloves to avoid touching others, and then worked to see how long he could survive. Along the way he developed a small amount of psychic talent (via a Brainer move upgrade), which was explained away in-game as a gift of the Hive parasite.
I hadn't read the Apocalypse World manual when I realised something very clear: moves snowball (which is pretty much the exact term in the playbook). It wasn't obvious to me when I first started playing RPGs. There was a hangover from things like Final Fantasy X and the like, that you as a player have wiggle-room, but ultimately you're moving at the MC's pace. But of course, this isn't true - and I can't imagine playing an RPG now where it was the norm that you were forced to do X at location A, and then attempt Y at location B (proceed straight to set piece C).
Chaplain was someone I was. He didn't die at the end of the chapter actually, although for a time it looked like none of the characters would survive. He came out of it worse for wear, nowhere to live, no great possessions to speak of, but he was alive, the parasite was dead, and even his friends pretty much didn't like him (although I would like to think they realised just how useful he was). I'm not sure I would take him up as a character if/when we return to Apocalypse World, but I know he'll always be there, hiding in the background, waiting to walk back on-camera and go aggro.
Sunday, 25 March 2012
Different Dice
I've been thinking about notation. A quick Google shows me that there are lots of people out there who are interested in probability questions with dice - and by extension with RPGs. Or perhaps that flows the other way, they are interested in games, and then start to get interested in how probabilities come from dice mechanics.
In either case, there are people out there who are interested in these areas. It's not my interest largely (when it comes to maths and RPGs) but it is definitely a good place to start, and one that throws up interesting points. Dice have different contexts. Rolling 2d6 in Apocalypse World, when you want to know the sum, gives you a value from 2 to 12, and those 11 values are distributed unevenly. In this case, you don't really care what either of the dice actually gives. You care about the total.
Rolling two d6s when you care about the values of each dice gives you a different proposition. Picture having a red d6 and a blue d6. Rolling 2 on red and 5 on blue results in something different from 5 on red and 2 on blue. Rather than have 11 values given by the sum of the faces, we have 36 possibilities, each with the same probability of occuring.
For future posts then we can consider 2d6 in the normal way and, to be clear, two d6 for the situation when we care about each individual result on the two d6s. Or three d8s. 3d10 is different from three d10s. A numeral in front of a die size will indicate that we want to sum them, a number in words will indicate that we want to use each result from the dice.
All sound fine? It might be a basic sort of thing to write about, but this is the foundations: important in games (of all kinds) and maths. On foundations we can extend outwards, upwards and in as many ways as can be supported.
In either case, there are people out there who are interested in these areas. It's not my interest largely (when it comes to maths and RPGs) but it is definitely a good place to start, and one that throws up interesting points. Dice have different contexts. Rolling 2d6 in Apocalypse World, when you want to know the sum, gives you a value from 2 to 12, and those 11 values are distributed unevenly. In this case, you don't really care what either of the dice actually gives. You care about the total.
Rolling two d6s when you care about the values of each dice gives you a different proposition. Picture having a red d6 and a blue d6. Rolling 2 on red and 5 on blue results in something different from 5 on red and 2 on blue. Rather than have 11 values given by the sum of the faces, we have 36 possibilities, each with the same probability of occuring.
For future posts then we can consider 2d6 in the normal way and, to be clear, two d6 for the situation when we care about each individual result on the two d6s. Or three d8s. 3d10 is different from three d10s. A numeral in front of a die size will indicate that we want to sum them, a number in words will indicate that we want to use each result from the dice.
All sound fine? It might be a basic sort of thing to write about, but this is the foundations: important in games (of all kinds) and maths. On foundations we can extend outwards, upwards and in as many ways as can be supported.
Friday, 23 March 2012
Getting Dice All Random
In my first post I mentioned that I had started to get interested in the maths of RPGs from the probabilities in Apocalypse World. There was something else that started me thinking, which is when one of the regulars in the gaming group I play with asked a question on his tabletop role-playing game blog, False Machine.
P was looking at randomly generating an island from a series of entries in a table. He had come up with a means to do that, but only on a computer, which meant while the island was randomly generated the setting would be determined ahead of his session. To him, the problem was, as he put it at the end of the post:
Problem solved! Until P realised later that there were actually 330 entries in the table for Isle of the Unknown. But this wasn't a problem either, if we imagined the entries arranged in ten tables, each with three columns and 11 rows. Roll a d10 for the table, a d3 (or d6/2 if you must be formal) and a d12 with re-rolls on the 12s. Again, problem solved!
Which got me thinking...
GMs who like to make things up through random tables could possibly have a large number of random encounters or random elements that they would like in tables. 330 or even 343 entries could be quite small. Is there, in general, a sensible schema that we can use for producing sets of random tables for game data, that we can index with dice? Let's assume d4, d6, d8, d10, d12 and d20s are available.
To put some bounds on this, let's assume, for now (although it may be easily extendable, who knows) that we want to consider for sets of random tables with up to 400 elements in total. I'm going to have a think about this and let you know what I think over the next week or so, as well as share a small random table of my own for In A Wicked Age.
P was looking at randomly generating an island from a series of entries in a table. He had come up with a means to do that, but only on a computer, which meant while the island was randomly generated the setting would be determined ahead of his session. To him, the problem was, as he put it at the end of the post:
I need a dice method that can randomise 343 hexesI've always had a strange little fascination with powers of numbers, so this jumped out at me as soon as I saw it. 343 is 7*7*7, which means that you could have seven tables, with seven rows and seven columns; you could then get any entry out of the 343 in your master list by rolling three d8s and re-rolling any 8s.
Problem solved! Until P realised later that there were actually 330 entries in the table for Isle of the Unknown. But this wasn't a problem either, if we imagined the entries arranged in ten tables, each with three columns and 11 rows. Roll a d10 for the table, a d3 (or d6/2 if you must be formal) and a d12 with re-rolls on the 12s. Again, problem solved!
Which got me thinking...
GMs who like to make things up through random tables could possibly have a large number of random encounters or random elements that they would like in tables. 330 or even 343 entries could be quite small. Is there, in general, a sensible schema that we can use for producing sets of random tables for game data, that we can index with dice? Let's assume d4, d6, d8, d10, d12 and d20s are available.
To put some bounds on this, let's assume, for now (although it may be easily extendable, who knows) that we want to consider for sets of random tables with up to 400 elements in total. I'm going to have a think about this and let you know what I think over the next week or so, as well as share a small random table of my own for In A Wicked Age.
Wednesday, 21 March 2012
Roll 2d6
There's a lot more to tabletop role-playing games than dice-rolling. A lot more. Role-playing is about inhabiting a character, thinking the way they might do, telling a story with others, playing a game.
Oh yeah, and hopefully having a good time while doing it.
I started playing tabletop role-playing games in autumn 2011. In the last six months or so I've played Apocalypse World, Cyberpunk, D&D, Microscope and In A Wicked Age. It was while playing AW that I started thinking about the maths associated with some of the mechanics in games.
AW has you roll 2d6 for actions. Depending on what stat you are rolling with you have a modifier (generally) from -2 to +3. It dawned on me at one point that my character - a Gunlugger - would have to roll a 2 or a 3 in order to outright fail at an aggressive action.
With that being the case, questions come my way: should I steer my Gunlugger towards violence, as he'll succeed? Should I steer him away from violence to make things more interesting? What do other people think?
As a mathematician I know that maths is everywhere. Including tabletop role-playing games. And not just in terms of the statistics of dice rolling. And so the idea for this blog came about. I don't know exactly what I'll write about, although I have some ideas. I'll talk about some maths, some actual play, some setting ideas and some game mechanic/rule ideas.
I hope you find something interesting here!
Oh yeah, and hopefully having a good time while doing it.
I started playing tabletop role-playing games in autumn 2011. In the last six months or so I've played Apocalypse World, Cyberpunk, D&D, Microscope and In A Wicked Age. It was while playing AW that I started thinking about the maths associated with some of the mechanics in games.
AW has you roll 2d6 for actions. Depending on what stat you are rolling with you have a modifier (generally) from -2 to +3. It dawned on me at one point that my character - a Gunlugger - would have to roll a 2 or a 3 in order to outright fail at an aggressive action.
With that being the case, questions come my way: should I steer my Gunlugger towards violence, as he'll succeed? Should I steer him away from violence to make things more interesting? What do other people think?
As a mathematician I know that maths is everywhere. Including tabletop role-playing games. And not just in terms of the statistics of dice rolling. And so the idea for this blog came about. I don't know exactly what I'll write about, although I have some ideas. I'll talk about some maths, some actual play, some setting ideas and some game mechanic/rule ideas.
I hope you find something interesting here!
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