Diary of a Failed Game Designer

Mixed bag post today: Part 1: AAIE is being run at Gen Con 😁 .. Not by me ..by Neal Tanner who is a Gen Con veteran and the  most adamant proponent of AAIE on the face of planet earth ... (more adamant even than  your's truly.) There were 5 seats at the table and they all sold!  Neal will have a full group of  what could be the most discriminating gamers, at the  granddaddy of all conferences. I hope he kills all of their characters in the most brutal and random ways possible. It's cool, knowing that one of my humble games will be  played at Gencon. I appreciate the effort Neal went through to make that happen. I have an odd relationship with Cons. I used to  joke with a friend back in school that someday we would make it to Gen-Con, I mean it's not that far honestly a couple hours by plane, we could do it. Now that I'm older and Gen-Con is so, so much bigger. I don't think I could do it anymore. I t has effectively been taken off my bucket list and r...

Monkey Business By Jens Durke. Disclosure: This can't be a review because I'm too close to the project. Not only did I chat with Jens often during his time working on the project. I also contributed some art. Rather than a review the following text should be considered info piece.   The writer behind the " Disoriented Range r (DR)" blog has put out a module called Monkey Business . It is currently available via Drive through RPG, I believe he plans on a POD version later on, though I can't directly speak to that. Anyone who has followed the DR blog in any capacity  will know that Jens does not take a shallow stab at anything. He specializes in deep dives. It doesn't matter if he's figuring out a method to roll up Hierarchies for NPC's or Preparing to Run an adventure  he always pulls from diverse schools of thought to put his ideas together. I can say without fear of insulting Jens that he "connects the dots" in interesting ways and designs ...

I started working on another section of AAIE a couple of months ago. This is part of it Hex Gids: Let's say my map starts at the very center of the grid  over here → That center hex is where the party of player characters is hanging out right now. The hex is covered in a thin deciduous forest. (marked with a green F) If I go one hex to the left, that hex is rolling hills. (It says Hill in green letters) If I go to the right that adjacent hex is mostly swamp. (Marked with a green S) That's all established: The hex marked with a question mark is the  problem. If the players explore that hex  It's terrain should take into account the terrain off all the hexes surrounding it. If I have a chart saying "roll a new terrain based on the hex the party is leaving." Only the Forest hex would be taken into account. that's not a bad solution but not necessarily a very complete one. Keeping in mind,  I'm not generating a hex field, or a large area. I'm generating he...

Most Recent AAIE Update: Added quick ideas for characters harvesting and selling parts of the monsters they slay.  Updated the three example monsters to include my most recent additions. (Resolve point spread, and Harvestable resources.) In AAIE characters don't get experience like characters get in other games. So in that way there is no reason to kill a monster if  the  party can just get the hell away from it.  That was a design decision based on the realization that Characters in AAIE  will vary from  Incredibly valid and effective to woefully ineffective failures waiting to die. The basic rewards for slaying a monster are two fold. One there's usually some quest going on that will net the party some status or financial reward upon successfully returning to town. Secondly a player may roll well enough (could be badly enough) or do something interesting enough to gain a story point. For clarity story points are the "experience" of this game. U...

This is one of those odd posts about my personal experiences and views on RPG's. If that's not what your into cool.  Skip this post and comeback for the next one I'll probably have some random charts or something. I thought the internet was going to fix this. Apparently I underestimated my own propensity to act like a hermit. I have a very small player base. A few good friends with whom I have been playing for years and in some cases decades. I love those guys, and appreciate them putting up with my creative impulses. As is the normal way of life however  we have gotten older, life has become busier. We rarely get to play games at the table. We have started to lean more and more heavily on virtual table tops like Roll 20 and I-table-top  to get our gaming fix. That leads me to my point: If I am doing 90% of my gaming on line anyway why am I not actively seeking new players to join in? WHy am I not using the  net, to  cast a larger net? I heard a podcaster the ot...

So I have this cold. This cold has plugged up my right ear in such a way that I can't hear a thing out of it. This also throws off my balance a bit. The closest thing I can describe to this effect is how one feels after getting punched hard in the ear. Rather than lasting for a few uncomfortable  minutes however this has been going on for days now and I'm starting to get a bit tired of it. When grasping for RPG related inspiration, I am not starting in a good place today. See Heroes don't catch the cold.. Never have I heard at the gaming table.  "Remember, Sir Gawain has the sniffles so he is at -2 on all his checks today." I am totally at -2 on all my checks today... totaly. The Dance of Death (1493) by Michael Wolgemut, Sickness was a bit part of life in human history. Plague , Parasites , bad nutrition, bad hygiene, and general short life expectancy made most of human history a tough slog towards a quick death. A simple cold, could go to pneumonia then on to d...

Blood Bowl... That games work shop classic. That: Rage inducing, Dice throwing, Mini smashing, Curse word inviting, mind numbing, table flipping, Classic. I've Played it..... Here's a variant rule: When a coach suffers a turnover on their turn rather than end their turn completely, the defending coach gets to take one of the following actions with any one figure on their team. (move, pick up a ball, foul, or block)  This is called an "off turn action." Each opposing figure my only have one such "off turn Action" during their opponents turn. A coach may not spend Re-rolls on off turn actions.  Once the "Off turn action" is resolved the the original coach may resume activating and taking actions with their team. A coach's turn ends only when that player has taken action with or skipped every figure on their team. Also here's  A skill for leveled up players: Opportunist:  Great at seizing opportunities as they present them selves. This player ...