Diary of a Failed Game Designer

Everything has a course For me this Blog has run it's course. It's time to close the door. I have a few thoughts about why  now is the right time to shutter this blog but to write a 5000 word eulogy about why I'm not going to blog anymore seems a bit strange. It's not important anyway. Not blogging doesn't equal not  playing, talking about, or writing games. Thanks you to everyone who read, commented on, or shared the things I posted over the past 4 and a half years. Of course special thanks to the two actual friends I have gained from the blogging experience. Charles Akins and Jens D. They have been constantly supportive of this blog. I appreciate that. I would gladly share a drink with either of them given the opportunity. I have to also thank Neal Tanner who has done more for my games than I have, and  honestly believes my designs are better than I think they are. We will continue to work together to finish projects and put material on the website and to distribu

Of villages and Names: Roll 1d30 for the name of the  town then 1d6 for why the town is named in such a manner, or some other  tidbit about the place. Black Wash A silty flood brings black soil to the area every  year. They grow excellent crops. All of the houses are stained a chalky black each spring with a mixture of  melted snow and the winter's ashes, The river runs black once a year and that is the only time a certain breed of  immature eel can be harvested. This  town is known for it's fine ink produced as a bi-product of the ell harvest mentioned in entry 3. There is a legend that this town is where a raven first bathed the darkness out of it's feathers to become a dove. There is still a ceremony held on the spring solstice in which  a raven is caged overnight and when the sun come up the  next day  the village children emerge from their homes to find a white dove in it's place. Gifts are then exchanged.  It is said that a demon was once slain in the northern mos

I had a few days off last week and I spent a good amount that time writing. I started working on an idea I had concerning the genre of 1970's Kung-Fu movies. These films are dear to my heart because I grew up watching them every Saturday on local broadcast television. Some people have Star wars nostalgia, I have have godzilla, Kung-fu theater, and WCCW wrestling out of texas. So I  came up with a setting brief. I thought about what I wanted the game to achieve. What I wanted the dice to do, the kinds of decisions I wanted the mechanics to support. I started typing. Ten thousand three hundred thirty six words later I realized I forgot to think about one thing. How will I play this game? I play mostly online via roll 20 these days. Roll 20 to me is the unfortunate artifact of being an adult  with  responsibilities beyond the gaming table. Our group as it is can't get together once a month, or even once a quarter during 2017. We can however usually get a weekday evening where we c

W arning, this post doesn't contain any usable gaming content. For that I'm sorry. Not sorry enough to stop typing, but just sorry enough to realize someone might  be looking for usable content, why waste their time. Honestly though, no one is going to read this, so who fuckign cares anyway. This  will stray a bit far afield,...Fair warning. There is a mountain of GM /DM ing advice on the internet. Some of the advice is practical. Things like "Here is how I used index cards to organize my notes", or "here is the shorthand I used to  write monster descriptions for quick reference." These are useful things that can help a new Gm. I'm all for that. There are people who have been playing for a very long time they're bound to have picked up a few tricks that make running games smoother. I'm all for that. Some internet DMing advice is personal opinion cloaked as useful tips. Even all that opinion can still be useful. Insightful opinions about how to ru