Categories
Uncategorized

Junteenth

Juneteenth[b] (officially Juneteenth National Independence Day and historically known as Jubilee Day,[2] Black Independence Day,[3] and Emancipation Day[4][5]) is a federal holiday in the United States commemorating emancipation of enslaved African Americans. It is also often observed for celebrating African American culture.[6] Originating in Galveston, Texas, it has been celebrated annually on June 19 in various parts of the United States since 1866. The day was recognized as a federal holiday on June 17, 2021, when President Joe Biden signed the Juneteenth National Independence Day Act into law.[7][8][9] Juneteenth’s commemoration is on the anniversary date of the June 19, 1865, announcement of General Order No. 3 by Union Army general Gordon Granger, proclaiming freedom for enslaved people in Texas.[10]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juneteenth

Categories
RPG

Stats, they speak to me

Most stats in most systems have effective ranges of 5 (-1, 0, 1, 2, 3) and often the same for skills and special abilities.
My condrium is intellectual there is a 5 point range but that doesn’t leave me feeling anything for them. DnD 3-18 gives me a feeling. SW d4,d6,d8,d10,d12 give me a feeling. Star Wars RPG 2d6-5d5 give me a feeling. Traveller 2-12 give me a normal feeling. But 20,40,60,80,100 don’t give me a feeling. The past 2 times we played CoC I had to mentally convert back to pre-7th ed to get the character feeling. This is maybe my biggest hurdle with Ironsworn, -1 to 3 ranges. Didn’t Star Frontiers do a percentile stats? Have this vague memory of never understanding the SF rules as a kid and just putting DnD characters in the setting when we played it.
Just one of those strange things probably from starting with DnD but it does put me off of some systems.

Categories
RPG

A Complicated Profession

Does anyone have good/fun mechanics for bounty hunting?

Find it interesting that the great bounty hunter Mando is only shown bringing in 2 bounties alive, Mythrol and the child.

Then Cowboy Beebop which is all about failed bounties.

I’ve noticed a lot of recent Beebop link games recently and while some have interesting ideas none seem to answer the bounty problem usefully.

Categories
RPG

RPG Best Mechanics Ideas

What are some of the best of mechanics to come out in the RPG space in the past decade?

Blades in the Dark Flashbacks
Advantage/Disadvantage rolling
Clocks, so i hear but don’t havn’t looked into yet
Playbooks, PtbA
Fail Forward, PtbA
Player Facing Rolls, PtbA
Point Crawl like Gardens of Ynn, Stygian Library, Neverland uses this for Faye land
Oracles, Ironsworn and Scarlet Heroes
Stars Without Number Factions system,
Fronts from Dungeon World but I haven’t looked into it yet
Letting the random tables define the world, Electronic Bationland and to some extent Greyhawk Fiolo random tables
Hexcrawling but fun, Hot Springs Island and Neverland
Categories
RPG

Protagonist Underdogs

Listening to an interview with Graham Walmsley about Cthulhu/Lovecraft gaming.

In his Cthulhu Dark mini game the protagonists have to be the underdog. When he added settings in the Victorian one the players are the underclass, orphans, prostitutes and beggars and not the upper class. He is british and found when playing  upper class characters players would become pretty nasty to the underclass.
In episode 49, we interview Graham Walmsley, writer of Play Unsafe, Stealing Cthulhu, and Cthulhu Dark, as well as two Trail of Cthulhu campaign books (The Final Revelation & Cthulhu Apocalypse).
Categories
RPG

The Vanilla Game

https://vanillagame.carrd.co/

Maybe a good candidate for a least feature DnD like base to build on.

And checkout the The Other Vanilla Game Jam

https://itch.io/jam/the-other-vanilla-game-jam

Categories
RPG

Kenneth Hite interview

Listening to a podcast interview with Kenneth Hite(Trail of Cthulhu, Night’s Black Agents, The Fall of Delta Green, GURPS Horror 3e)
https://9littlebees.com/mab019-kenneth-hite-horror/
Horror is about player emotion at the table. If all the players are not willing to bring emotion to the table Horror doesn’t work. Think we have talked around this a bit but he seemed to sum it up succinctly. Also part of why Ravenloft and the Domains of Dread doesn’t really work, people are playing DnD not Horror.
Second one was to read masterpieces of the hobby. In context he suggests Masks of Nyarlathotep as a masterpiece of sandbox.
Categories
Uncategorized

Westworld has gone Cyberpunk

1/2 way into Westworld s3e1 it has gone cyberpunk. Not cp2020 but cp2050 if it was written in 2019.

Now my wondering is what the Westworld/Delos parks would have been like if Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild was the inspiration instead of Red Dead Redemption? GTA in the old west vs. Miyazaki’s Princess Monokee by Nintendo.

Categories
Board Games

Spirit Island Boardgame

Played Spirit Island this weekend and recommend playing it if given a chance.

https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/162886/spirit-island

The flavor of the game is a reverse Settlers of Catan, anti-colonalism. Players are spirits of an island trying to get the settlers to leave.

The mechanics start middle of the road difficulty but as the game progresses get really complicated.

My first play at about the midpoint had buffer overflow and had to play a turn on autopilot while I rebooted. The 2 experienced at the table warned me and the other newbie it was to be expected. We did end up kicking the colonizers out through fear and natural disasters.

We played it over Table Top Simulator, the mod had excellent scripting, no glitching but I think ti would play better in person as the table gets information dense as the game progresses.

Lots of fun.

Categories
Uncategorized

Aliens Extended Edition

Watching Aliens Extended Edition while some of the deleted scenes are interesting, fill in gaps of the story, ultimately the theatrical cut is paced better.