ttrpg

A great post from Monte Cook on anxiety for first-time designers. Remember that product that gamers love that includes A, B, and C? A lot of designers will look at that, put A, B, and C in their own product, and then figure they’re done.

This week I’ve been in the Netherlands for work, so between jet lag and meetings I’ve been pretty wiped out. Still, I’ve managed to get a few non-work related things done as well.

I try to post cool new arrivals from Kickstarters and pre-orders when they arrive, usually to my Mastodon account,1 but with the business at work and with the podcast it slipped past me.

The new version of the license is “over 9,000 words long”, and, well, it sounds pretty bad.

I realize it’s actually Tuesday, but it’s been a while since I’ve done one of these weeknotes, so here we go! Over the course of the last week: Finished watching Brand New Cherry Flavor on Netflix, which was an outstanding horror miniseries.

I wrote recently about receiving my backer copy of Monster Care Squad, which is a Ghibli-inspired RPG about the people caring for the magical monsters that once protected their communities from a terrible illness.

So you’re getting ready to kick off a campaign for your gaming group? Before you even get started, ask yourself: are you looking to create a campaign that will simply be fun, or one that your players will be talking about for years to come?

It isn’t news to anyone that I’m a big fan of Numenera. It is my favorite game to run and I will shamelessly hype for it to anyone who will listen.

Last Tuesday, I wrapped up a two-month introductory adventure for Invisible Sun. It was my first time running the game, and all my players were new to it as well. One other had also backed the original Kickstarter, but this was his first opportunity to play.

Numenera Discovery and Destiny in their slipcase cover Numenera Discovery and Destiny are here, and they do not disappoint. As always, Monte Cook Games nails the production quality, with some beautiful volumes filled with incredible art.

This July, I’ll be running my first convention game of an RPG at GeeklyCon. I’ve been a DM for many years, but my focus has been running long term campaigns for my friends.

This article from Strolen’s Citadel is easily the best piece of practical advice for a DM that I’ve found. Dungeon design is difficult to get right. Despite what the swollen published modules may lead you to believe, shorter crawls are almost always better.

I’ve recently written about Monte Cook’s game Numerera, and by all accounts, the game appears to be enjoying some success, or at least significant buzz. Many creators would be content with that and simply double-down on that product.

Welcome to the Ninth World As I’ve been running my D&D campaign, I’ve become interested in the alternative role-playing systems that came about after my initial foray into gaming. It all started because I was looking for inspiration for fun rule tweaks I could incorporate into my games that would foster more role-play and streamline combat.

I recently wrote about my return to Dungeons and Dragons, and promised another post where I would share what tools our group is using to facilitate our long-distance games. It’s really critical to make sure that game groups are well organized, or many campaigns will fizzle out due to the amount of work involved.

I’ve been playing Dungeons & Dragons again for the first time in over ten years. It’s been a lot of fun, and challenging as well. When I started playing again, I elected to start by being the DM for my group, which is quite a bit of work, but very rewarding.