Free RPG Day 2015 @ Proud Lion!

by Rae

In addition to our normal gaming events scheduled throughout the month, this June sees the return of Free RPG Day! On Saturday 20th June, Proud Lion will be hosting sessions of D&D Expeditions, followed by an evening at Boston Tea Party where we will also be running Dread and Star Wars: Edge of the Empire.

D&D Expeditions is the perfect way to get a taste of 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons. Each Expedition is only a few hours long – perfect for a quick adventure! We will be running two different Expeditions on the day. The first will run from 10:30am until 3pm. The second will be a split session, running in store from 3:30pm until 5pm, then continuing at Boston Tea Party from 6pm until 9pm.

There will be a maximum of four players for each Expedition, and to ensure Expeditions are balanced, pre-generated characters will be made available - no custom characters will be allowed. Tickets are free, but must be reserved via Ticketsource in order to play. Please note this is not a drop-in, drop-out session – please only reserve a ticket if you will be staying for the complete session!

Our evening offerings at Boston Tea Party will also be free but will again require tickets via Ticketsource. Our first, Star Wars: Edge of the Empire, is based on the adventure contained within the Beginner Box, and serves as an excellent introduction into this science fiction RPG. Our second evening game will be Dread, a horror RPG that is centred around a classic game of Jenga. Both games will run from 6pm to 9pm at Boston Tea Party and can support up to four players. Again, both games will be using pre-generated characters for all players.

In order to reserve your space for one of these games, please follow the link below to our Ticketsource page, where you can select which game you wish to play and claim a spot.

In order to ensure as many people as possible get a chance, we are limiting each player to playing only one of the above games on the day.

Click here to reserve a ticket for Free RPG Day!

However, that doesn't mean you can't bring your own games! Feel free to grab your friends and run an RPG of your own along side us in the evening. We'd love to see more people getting involved and trying out different RPG systems! We'll see you all on Free RPG Day!

Rae has a lot of RPG stories in her head this week!

Big Game Hunting Live - Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition

by Rae

It's time for Big Game Hunting Live! This is a monthly gaming event that takes place on the second Saturday of every month. Players will get a chance to learn and play featured games all day long.

This month we're featuring Dungeons & Dragons, 5th Edition!

Dungeons & Dragons is the classic role playing game that will be familiar to many. You choose a character, you explore dungeons, you fight monsters and pick up some pretty epic loot along the way. That's exactly what we're inviting players to do this Saturday, with a day-long session of the newest edition of D&D.

During the adventures, we will be ensuring that players get a taste of dungeon crawling and monster battling. We also will encourage players in general roleplay. Most of the fun of this game style is in deciding how your character would react in a given situation, and making the most of it to enjoy the story being told. Of course, the DM (Dungeon Master) will be there to guide you – and sometimes to throw in a random element just to keep things interesting!

On the day, all players are welcome, whether you've been playing D&D since it came into existence or you've never seen it before! Pre-generated characters will be provided and adventures will be compact, allowing for an easy drop-in, drop-out day for players. (Please do not bring your own characters for this particular event.)

The play session will start just after 11am and will run until closing time at 5pm, with a short break  midway through the day. 

See you Saturday 9th August!

All participants will receive a voucher that entitles them to 10% off any D&D product. Cannot be used with any other offer.

Rae is possibly enjoying being a DM more than she wants to admit.

Big Game Hunting - Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition NOW AVAILABLE TO PRE-ORDER

by Ben Fardon

After length speculation, Wizards Of The Coast have finally unveiled the details for Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition.

We can now start taking pre-orders on the following items. Unlike the release of 4th Edition, this new edition is once again staggered across several months. All release dates are subject to change of course.

It all kicks off with the Starter Box in July. This is everything you need to get stuck in, and we'll be hoping to run a launch event at the store where you can join us on a short adventure. More details on that to follow.

In August, the Players Handbook arrives alongside the first pre-written adventure, the Tyranny Of Dragons: The Hoard Of The Dragon Queen. Interestingly, these new adventures were not designed in house by the Wizards of the Coast team. Instead they've been developed in conjunction with Kobold Press, designers Wolfgang Bauer (founder of Kobold Press and former designer/developer for WotC and TSR) and Steve Winter (former editor/designer at WotC and TSR, plus co-creator of the computer game Pool of Radiance), which ha certainly piqued the interest of the international gaming community.

The following months see the release of the Monster Manual, the Dungeon Masters Guide and the second Tyranny Of Dragons adventure which sees the dramatic return of Tiamat!

PRE-ORDER AND SAVE!

JULY 15TH

STARTER BOX

RRP £17.00

PRE-ORDER PRICE £15.00 (requires £5 deposit)

The Dungeons & Dragons Starter Set is your gateway to action-packed stories of the imagination. This box contains the essential rules of the game plus everything you need to play heroic characters on perilous ad- ventures in worlds of fantasy.

Ideal for 4 – 6 players, the Starter Set includes a 64-page adventure book, a 32-page rulebook for playing characters level 1 – 5, 5 pre-generated characters, each with a character sheet and supporting reference material, and 6 dice.

AUGUST 19TH

PLAYER’S HANDBOOK

RRP £30.00

PRE-ORDER PRICE £27.00 (requires £7 deposit)

The Player’s Handbook is the essential reference for every Dungeons & Dragons roleplayer. It contains rules for character creation and advancement, backgrounds and skills, exploration and combat, equipment, spells, and much more. Use this book to create exciting characters from among the most iconic D&D races and classes.

TYRANNY OF DRAGONS: HOARD OF THE DRAGON QUEEN - ADVENTURE

RRP £20.00

PRE-ORDER PRICE £18.00 (requires £5 deposit)

In an audacious bid for power the Cult of the Dragon, along with the Red Wizards of Thay, seek to bring Tiamat from her prison in the Nine Hells to Faerun. To this end, they are sweeping from town to town, lay- ing waste to all those who oppose them and gathering a hoard of riches for their dread queen. The threat of annihilation has become so dire that groups as disparate as the Harpers and Zhentarim are banding together in the fight against the cult. Never before has the need for heroes been so desperate.

SEPTEMBER

MONSTER MANUAL

RRP £30.00

PRE-ORDER PRICE £27.00 (requires £7 deposit)

The Monster Manual presents a horde of classic Dungeons & Dragons creatures, including dragons, giants, mind flayers, and beholders—a monstrous feast for Dungeon Masters ready to challenge their players and populate their adventures.The monsters contained herein are culled from the D&D game’s illustrious history, with easy-to-use game statistics and thrilling stories to feed your imagination.

OCTOBER

TYRANNY OF DRAGONS: THE RISE OF TIAMAT - ADVENTURE

RRP £20.00

PRE-ORDER PRICE £18.00 (requires £5 deposit)

The Cult of the Dragon leads the charge in an unholy crusade to bring Tiamat back to the Realms, and the situation grows more perilous for heroes with each passing moment. The battle becomes increasingly politi- cal as opportunities to gather allies and gain advantage present themselves. From Waterdeep to the Sea of Moving Ice to Thay, it is a race against Evil. Succeed or succumb to the oppression of draconic tyranny. Win or lose, things will never be the same again.

NOVEMBER

DUNGEON MASTER’S GUIDE

RRP £30.00

PRE-ORDER PRICE £27.00 (requires £7 deposit)

The Dungeon Master’s Guide provides the inspiration and the guidance you need to spark your imagination and create worlds of adventure for your players to explore and enjoy. Inside you’ll find world-building tools, tips and tricks for creating memorable dungeons and adventures, optional game rules, hundreds of classic D&D magic items, and much more!

To pre-order, you can either pop in store or email me at shop@proudlion.co.uk. Deposits to secure your pre-orders can be paid in store by cash or card, or if pre-ordering via email I can send you a PayPal invoice. as I say, stay tuned for more details about our D&D 5th Edition launch event in the coming weeks.

Ben Fardon is ready for a few days off. No, not ready - desperate. Desperate for a few days off.

Play more games at the Proud Lion Gaming Bar!

Proud Lion is two floors of geeky solitude in the heart of the Cotswolds. Alongside the comics, graphic novels and merchandise, we also have board games, card games and RPGs including the Gaming Bar upstairs.

In recent months it's played host to TableTop Day and LCG Day, and there's a second LCG Day taking place on Saturday 20th April. But what a lot of people don't realise, is the Gaming Bar is available to any gamers to use any day we're open. Just turn up and play! No fee, no need to book - first come, first served.

We're adding a red noticeboard upstairs, where gamers can advertise meet ups and seek other players - either in-store or further afield. I know there's a huge community of gamers out there; we look forward to seeing you guys in-store!

Ben Fardon is exciting for the return of the Ice Warriors!

Big Game Hunting - Free RPG Day 2012: SATURDAY 16TH JUNE

So Free RPG Day is now only a few weeks away!

I'm pleased to be able to announce that we'll be taking over the empty shop next door to Proud Lion for ONE DAY ONLY!

42 Albion Street gives us the space to run six different RPG sessions, covering three different RPGs - D&D 4E, Battletech and the new Warhammer 40K RPG Only War, which features the Imperial Guard.

There will be a lunchtime session running from 11-1pm, then an afternoon session running from 3-5pm. Spaces will be limited and you will need to sign up in advance to get a place, but they will be free and all attendees will get a copy of the adventure they played to take away at the end of the game.

SIGN UP IS NOW OPEN!

Please email me at shop@proudlion.co.uk telling me which game session you would like to register for.

You can choose ONE from the following:

11-1pm - D&D 4E (5 spaces)

11-1pm - Battletech (4 spaces)

11-1pm - WH40K (4 spaces)

3-5pm - D&D 4E (5 spaces)

3-5pm - Battletech (4 spaces)

3-5pm - WH40K (4 spaces)

SPACES WILL BE ALLOCATED FIRST COME, FIRST SERVED. You will receive a confirmation email. If we've run out of spaces for your chosen session, I will contact you if there are alternatives.

Here's the Facebook event for those who use it for maintaining their schedules!

Ben Fardon is trying to juggle all the things!

Big Game Hunting - Free RPG Day 2012

I hope everyone enjoyed Free Comic Book Day 2012! It was a huge success for Proud Lion this year - I'm very grateful to everyone who helped out and all of you for coming down and making it something special.

That's not the end of this year's freebies though! Coming in June we have Free RPG Day 2012. Keep your eyes peeled for more details in the coming weeks. For now, all I'll say for definite is keep Saturday 16th June free in your schedules!

Offerings this year will include a Battletech/Shadowrun Quickstart RPG flipbook; a Warhammer 40K Roleplay Only War Adventure called Eleventh Hour; a Pathfinder Adventure called Dawn of the Scarlet Sun; and a D&D 4E Adventure called Dead in the Eye.

We have a few items left from Free RPG Day 2011. If you'd like a free Quickstart RPG book, ask me next time your in and I'll see what we've still got.

Many thanks to our regular contributor Todd Marsh for the pictures for Free RPG Day 2012.

Ben Fardon is determined to put the finishing touches to the gaming bar in the coming fortnight.

Big Game Hunting - The One Ring RPG

One RPG to rule them all…

I’ve always been a bit leery of games that are set in huge franchises. I’ve seen them go amazingly (I quite like Babylon 5 for example) and go horribly (the less said about most of the D20 games, the better) but there’s an element of ‘oh now, come on, there’s a board game, computer game, war-game and now a new RPG based Lord Of The Rings to contend with. And I went into it expecting to hate it.

This isn’t an actual play look – in fact, I didn’t get to run it once since I received the review copy – that’ll come later in one of my actual play articles for Big Game Hunting, but what I did do was look at the mechanics from a GM's point of view, and what I saw was really nice.

I’ve played both previous incarnations of an LOTR RPG, and while they were solid, the One Ring wasn’t exactly coming in handicapped – each had its flaws, and neither really made the most of the most extensive and influential (some might argue) property in fantasy. It’s kind of like they’d bought up the prime beach property then let weeds grow in some ways. Along comes ‘The One Ring,’ and holy cow, it’s good.

It’s not set in the times of the War of the Ring.  It’s long before the tales of the Shire that everyone knows from LOTR/the Hobbit. There are decades before the world goes pear-shaped like that.

Due to the review copy I had, I didn’t have the special D12 that came with the box set (mine is a PDF) but it didn’t stop me from understanding the instructions and getting enough of a feel for it that I want my full copy now. I thought all of the mechanics were laid out well, and have touches of other games about them, but is blended enough to be unique. The PDF is nice and clear and renders well on my eReader and iPad, which is one of the more important things for me when looking at rules issues in PDFs.

One of the problems though with reviewing like this, is that I didn’t actually get to play – which is why we’re going to get a full copy soon and do a play through and offer an actual play game at some point.  With strong background and rules that are integrated rather than bent to fit the world this is a fitting and strong homage to Tolkien’s universe, without becoming too heavy or difficult to manage.  There’s plenty of scope for adventure and fun, or building into disasters that start small and end the continent, including leading your characters – eventually into the events surrounding the books that fans love and cherish.

Next week, Kai’s going to be reviewing Dragon Age and its expansion - while staunchly ignoring the EA nonsense brewing over the Mass Effect DLC.

Big Game Hunting - Rogue Trader

Published by Fantasy Flight, Rogue Trader and its supplements (plus its predecessor Dark Heresy and its supplements, plus various subsequent sister-RPGs) are an entertaining and often hilarious sci-fi game where mayhem ensues, out amongst the stats. Or, perhaps, it’s just the campaign I’m involved in…

Background: Rogue Trader is an ‘offshoot’ of sorts of Warhammer 40K, which is a popular tabletop war gaming game. I can’t think of a roleplayer that I know that hasn’t played one of Games Workshop’s games, even unwittingly, so the background is pretty much immersed in gaming pop culture. Rogue Trader takes an element of that – specifically the ‘little guy’ concept and sticks you out amongst the stars, against the backdrop of the history as your GM knows and interprets it.

As to whether it’s important – if you want to play a space game, no. The background is only important to understand why it’s difficult to get your hands on tech (which can be accepted at face value) and why there are things that you really need to watch out for (but again, geek and gaming pop culture covers most of that). Background DOES make it richer, especially if you’re using character types from the expansion books.

Mechanics: Character generation isn’t complicated – it’s dice rolling (d100 aka 2 x d10) and applying those rolls to a basic set of stats, then designing your character - which increases or decreases your stats, gives you talents, etc. My favourite part of it is there’s a map of sorts that takes you to your ultimate role in the game – so there’s only certain things the Rogue Trader can have versus what the Astropath has. It’s interesting enough that you weigh stuff off. Then, your GM gives you XP and you put customisations onto your character, again, based on your overall character. What it gives is robust characters that can do what they need to – but it does also lead to a bit of a character ‘lock’ of sorts.

The add-on books and sister-RPGs (and there are lots of them – including Death Watch) add additional character types, extra levelling ‘stuff’ and more background. Along with all new ways for your GM to really insert the proverbial chainsword.

Gameplay: Overall, I’d say Rogue trader is a great game. I’ve really enjoyed it so far. We’re in the middle of the second iteration of a very long term campaign. It’s not so restrictive that you can’t do what you want and respond to something in your own way, but it’s not so open that you can completely wreck your chances of survival – most of the time. There are some really irritating aspects of the game, but I think most of it is personal preference.

While Rogue Trader isn’t where I started playing this version of the games (I’ve played Dark Heresy), I have to say that Rogue Trader is the one that really stands out for me. I’ve got a wonderful GM (my other half), and I think that’s really made the difference to the game.

This week... Kai screwed up. Book is running late and she’s really not enjoying being an author. She has a plan though (and next week she’s reviewing Battlestar Galactica).

Big Game Hunting - Game design roundup

So, the last five articles I’ve provided talked about how to design a game, everything from setting and backstory to design. The final part of this is distributing it.

And I’m a bit of an expert when it comes to distribution it has to be said. In my ‘real world’ job, I’m a copywriter, editor and PR specialist as well as crazy author type lady. And to be honest, it’s the bit I like the best.

The best bit about producing a game that works is sharing it with others – I know many people that take part in homebrew projects and then keep them to themselves – which is a waste in some ways. If you’re having fun and after some really robust tests (hint, I usually find wine and a group of friends that are up for a laugh really helps after final design) and it still works – I’d say release it.

But the question would then become ‘how’?

With digital printing and print on demand, it’s not as difficult as it used to be – but, no matter what anyone tells you, it’s going to cost you something. If you’re not a professional writer, you’re going to need an editor (though, your friends might help with that) and an artist (again, friends might help). At that point, you could just distribute it as a PDF – there are some great sites that let you do so (including Drivethru RPG).

And if you want to involve a local element – print some business cards with a download code and give them to your local store. They sell one, he hands out the card – some software lets you generate one-time access codes – others will rely on the honesty of people buying from the local store to not give out the URL.

And if that makes money – consider investing in a real live print run. The gaming industry is pretty well set up for that – one of the groups in my home town, Contested Grounds Studios put out a|state when I was still back home, over six years ago and it was a roaring success. Gregor Hutton, who is an amazing game designer (and a good friend), puts out his games quite a lot and appears at gaming events. He’s the reason I design my own stuff – after chasing me to take part in a 24 hour RPG contest. The only thing that really limits you is the time you’ve got to invest – because that’s often a bigger ‘expense’ than printing, especially if you go PDF first, then offer a print run.

A final thing to remember – where I can, I buy the extra PDFs that go with our games because I like them on my iPad – and with the Kindle Fire coming soon, it might be that GMs find their favourite tool isn’t their dice roller, it’s their e-reader. In which case, the investment for indies is going to be tiny.

This week, Kai is still editing. The less said about it, the better, but on the bright side, the book is out on the 12th February!

Big Game Hunting - The penultimate... fight scene?

So, you’ve got background, you’ve got character, you’ve got stats... what’s last?

The only thing we’ve not talked about so far is fighting and other rolls to ‘gain’ something. Contested checks are great fun, but unless you have a great grasp of the underlying basis of your game, and what you *want* from it and its setting, contested checks are also the hardest thing to design.

And unfortunately, they’re also the area I’m weakest in. So instead of explaining how they work, I thought I’d save you a bit of time and tell you about a disaster I had designing my CSI style game.

So, picture the scene. I’ve got this kick ass mechanic that lets you accurately decide how long something is going to take to solve, and a chart that lets you ‘rank’ your investigation by how long it takes to solve something – there’s even a mechanic to decide if the person escapes or commits another crime. It all works. I’ve got rolls for science checks and XP bonuses for people to award if the description and ‘jargon’ is right.

And then I got onto capturing the criminal, if she/he hasn’t escaped.

The problem I encountered was that I could not weight the rolls to show that the criminal was/wasn’t a mastermind and was/wasn’t adept. Some crimes were vicious – others were planned. And unless the GM had separate tables to roll against, invariably, the CSI’s, no matter how weedy, kicked his/her ass.

The thing is, the more varied the game, and the encounters, the harder the contested rolls will be to design. In the end, I left that freeform – it’s part of the GM set up right at the beginning. There’s 12 tables to pick from, and the GM picks one from each row of three – and that covers every conceivable event that you’ll hit for ‘fighting’ – and that forms part of the ‘bad guy’ character gen. It’s not the most satisfying solution, but it works. So, I’d say that if you’re not getting what you want approaching it head on, try it from another side. You never know – it might work better if you make it more rigid – or if it’s too rigid – make it less rigid.

This week, Kai lied last week and is still on FINAL, LAST CHANCE edits for Glass Block. She’s also thinking hard about what to write next week And yes, she’s considering how to share the CSI game too – if her brain doesn’t asplode first.

Big Game Hunting - Sully their character!

Game designers are, let’s face it, responsible for most of the initial shouting and swearing that goes on around the table in general, and also some of the biggest hilarity before people actually gets into the game itself. That's right, this week I'm talking about the player character design process.

Depending on how people choose characteristics, both good and bad, will dictate how they play their character in game. Also, you’re giving the GM fuel at this point – the truly savvy GM listens to how people describe their characters, and how others discuss and react to the information they share.

Abilities and skills are interchangeable in the minds of players, but it’s important to understand when designing games that there are three sub types of designing a character. It’s key to explore a couple of systems before settling on how you’re handling this bit – you can either have something that’s really ‘rigid’ but actually generates the right range of characters for the game, or something really loose and give your players the chance to rely on luck and common sense.

Positive and negative are difficult to consider in terms of characteristics. So once you’ve generated the vital ‘statistics’, (whether bought or via dice roll), the next step is almost always to choose from a list of characteristics. Of course, for the game writer, it’s not as easy as ‘just picking’. Depending on the mechanic of the game, you’ll design it in one of several ways.

Both ways are basically based around XP though – the GM will give the gamers a pool of points to buy stats from. And this is the game designer part - you have to think about how your player is going to design the character they’re going to play. And to do this, you have to think about archetypes.

Archetypes are the stereotypical ‘meta’ characters that people can create. Warrior, mage, healer, rogue, etc. Each of these character types have strengths and weaknesses. This is your ability/attribute/skill set pool. So, you can create the characters, brain storm over the elements you think you might need, and playtest, playtest, playtest! And then, add a splash of personality. So, you’re a fighter and you’re good at it – you’re probably going to be an arrogant toad. So, add arrogance (and give that stat a consequence – you could add points back into the pool to buy something else, but it could mean that in certain rolls, you have a penalty. Positive stats cost more to buy, but add to rolls, or give automatic successes etc.)

There’s a final part to this – you need both the positive, and the negative. Without negative traits characters aren’t only one dimensional, but they’re difficult to play, and mostly unsatisfying. So, ensure that there’s some nasty in with all that nice.

D Kai Wilson-Viola is on FINAL EDITS for Glass Block and is genuinely wishing her senile cat would stop the pre-dawn chorus.

Big Game Hunting - System thoughts (this might get a bit complicated)

I’ve always thought of system as the bit where people say ‘and here comes the science part’ in the advert (and the character dying as the ‘because you’re WORTH IT’ bit), but system is one of those things that I understand well enough to design, but probably not well enough to explain.

System is complicated, it’s scary, and it’s strange. So why is it, exactly, that I’m trying to reinvent the wheel designing my own? And worse than that, encouraging you, gentle GM to do the same?

Simple – if a system doesn’t work for you, it doesn’t work for your players either. Partially broken systems lead simply to “munchkinning” (where a player designs a character that deliberately breaks the rules) and the only person that doesn’t really enjoy that is well... everyone, there’s no harm in it, right?

Well, right. And wrong. Because if you’re one of the blessed few that can do better, then you should.

Designing a system comes down to ensuring that something is not only balanced, but works in ways that would work, whether you remove the optional parts. It works, whether your player is lower level or higher level, and is balanced to make sense in your universe. It can be a very difficult thing to do – because balance goes beyond players and NPCs and means that if there’s a cause and effect style event, that the rules cover that too. I remember play testing a game once and discovering that for even marginally unlucky to even kinda lucky dice rolls, we had to change the system because tripping and falling off the curb killed!

While you don’t think about that, the important thing when designing a system with balance is to remember that even after play testing, you have to find and apply errata. There are various game companies out there and there are frequently errata issued, so that’s OK. Whether this bothers you or not is your choice, but after extensive play testing you’ll still find something that you haven’t thought of. Which is why system designing becomes more and more complicated as time goes by – and each iteration can introduce complications – so it’s important to build a base system underneath that works. Once you’ve got the ‘solid’ base, it should bend but not break.

Whether it’s diceless, one dice or several dice types, find a system that works for you, then you can quantify – it doesn’t matter what dice you use, as long as it makes some measure of sense.

This week, Kai is getting angry at MS Word’s rigid spell check – munckinning is a word dammit!

Big Game Hunting - So… you want to design a game?

RPG games are some of the most amazing things that people can ever write – they’re more intensely interactive than most books and can take people into new worlds that they’ve never experienced. Give them the opportunity to explore as people they can never be.

As a games designer, it’s YOUR job to give the GM the tools to create the worlds that underpin and support their story. It’s your job to find the best rules set and character design and background to work with what they want, and it’s your job to excite and entice them into playing games.

So, with all of the games and all of the systems out there, why would you design one in the first place, and where do you start?Design is one of those things that can’t really be described – it’s something that you find yourself, but as a game design ‘rule set’, there are a couple of things that you should consider.

And over the next five weeks, or more, I’m going to talk about them. For now though, this post is to get you thinking about why you want to design a game, whether you can adapt an existing system, and if not, what you need to think about.

The why is a very personal thing. Game design comes down to filling a gap, either that you’ve got yourself, or one that you can see in the market. My games have always been designed around my books – because they’re important to me. I could have adapted other games out there, but I always worried that they wouldn’t help. For example, right now, I’m designing a game that requires multiple rolls for certain passes – and that these are always a core set and depending on the rolls, overall, will depend on the result. It’s complex, so it needs thoroughly tested, and I don’t think there’s anything quite like it out there. I’m designing this because it’s a specific thing that I couldn’t overcome in any other way. That’s my why. Yours may be more or less complicated.

If you can adapt a game, you might find that easier – it’s often how designers get into understanding the central ideas around designing games. But remember, sometimes its easier to set up your won stuff, so don’t always bodge systems.

Finally – if you’re designing a game, you need to consider a lot of things – from background to rule set to dice, and structure and system. All mostly interlock, so it’s important to start with the hardest one and bend the easier ones to match. Or at least, that’s how I do it.

Next week I’m going to talk system.

This week, Kai is testing out a three part dice roll system. It’s complicated.

Big Game Hunting - Game design pre-qualification

Want to design a game? Have you got an idea of the type of game you’d like to do? Good! That’s a great start – but it’s often there that people get stuck. How do you go from idea to game? Concept to completion?

Once you’ve worked out what you want to write – and once you’ve got the idea on paper, whether that’s the key NPC, or the background story, or a mix of a whole pile of notes, the next thing you need to think about is your game system.

Because there are so many game systems out there, thinking about your game system is probably one of the biggest decisions you’ll make. It not only dictates how you’ll design your system, it also gives you the support you need to work out how to take those first steps.

When I’m designing a game, I actually work with my own hybrid systems – partially to do with chance (d10) and partially to do with set attributes - based on various criteria. I’ve seen other games that use chips, dice, or counters, so don’t feel you’re constrained to complicated character sheets – while many people enjoy building characters, it’s often a good idea to make your first game something you could write and play with ease. Most people that decide they want to write a game have been playing for a very long time – so have systems that they like, and don’t like.

One of the other recommendations I was given, when starting game design was not to start with the ‘big’ game I had in mind – I’m still in the process of writing to games that are huge – one forensics based, and one based around the sci-fi serial of books I was writing. But the first game I ever wrote was a 24hourrpg project. It was a lot of fun and was very easily broken, but it gave me the chance to write and play something very silly, and very easy to test. It also showed me the areas that games break, straight away – both games I wrote that year for the 24hourrpg broke exactly the same way.


In the next couple of articles, I’m going to talk specifics. What sort of game systems there are out there? Why you need flavour text (and how to decide how to write it)? And how (and who) to test your games? But for now – what’s your idea? Got one?

This week, Kai is writing furiously, enjoying the peace and quiet of school returns, and is really geeked out about Animal Man. She still can’t fix the problem with her forensics game.

Interludes…

This week, if you’ll indulge me a little, we’re going to have a brief float around an entirely liminal state. The Reluctant Geek in its previous incarnation is finished (boo!), but your new (and fingers crossed improved) Saturday morning read is on its way.

In the meantime we’re in a rather lovely no man’s* land. Let’s imagine tiny fluffy clouds, and beautiful stars, and maybe the soothing sound of running water or whale song or something in the background.

Actually, I could really do with some soothing sounds currently, not least because I am recently returned from the Proud Lion Blog Night Out. I’d very much like to talk to you about motorboating, Thundercat slash and the excessive sassiness of some of my fellow bloggers, but it’s all a little bit like Fight Club - The first rule of Blog night out is that you do not talk about Blog night out. Sufficeth to say there were a few drinks involved...

Anyway, all of this floaty, inbetweeny stuff means that I am even more prone to wandering off track than usual, so let’s drag ourselves back to business. I would like you to imagine for a moment that you have a friend. (There’s more, don’t worry, this isn’t some carte blanche attack on your social skills…) This friend has never picked up a comic, switches the channel when anything vaguely sci-fi comes on to the television and thinks that ‘roleplaying’ is best confined to the bedroom. Perhaps they had a bad experience dressed as Batman as a child, involving paddling pools and public humiliation. Perhaps an air of carefully cultivated ‘cool’ prevents them from showing any kind of interest when you start discussing the relative merits of the tenth and eleventh doctors. Whatever the reason, you would be afraid to take this friend into Proud Lion for fear of triggering a fully blown panic attack.

Still with me on the whole visualisation thing? Excellent! Now I would like you to imagine that you awake one morning filled with evangelical zeal. You *will* convert your friend or else die trying! And rather than some kind of namby pamby, incremental , starting-off-with-the-soft-stuff approach you’re going straight in at the deep end.

The question then, is what comic/graphic novel/tv show or movie would you offer to aforementioned ignoramus to change their mind? If you had to pick just one thing that encapsulates everything you love about the world of comics and sci fi and fantasy, what would it be?

Now I don’t want you to think that all of my questions involve ulterior motives. There may come a point in the future where we all close our eyes and imagine ourselves in beautiful, flower filled gardens just for the hell of it. But I’ll ‘fess up now that this is not one of those occasions. Leave a comment detailing your own personal favourite, or pop into the shop in the next week or so and chat to Ben about those seminal, defining pieces of art, and I promise I’ll be gentle with your selections...

Unless of course they really need a firm hand. In which case all bets are off.

*Note: No man’s land. Even though a part of me still wants to say person’s, I’m too afraid of the combined wrath of Ben Fardon and Robert Barton-Ancliffe!

This week, Kate is fantasising about log cabins in the woods, swimming in the sea and Captain Jack Harkness. Not necessarily simultaneously.

Big Game Hunting - Free RPG Day

Saturday 18th June is Free RPG Day!



Now into it's fifth year, some of the biggest and best RPG publishers are bringing you some freebies for one day only!

Pop in store from 10:00am on Saturday and claim yourself one of the following:

Eden Studios

All Flesh Must Be Eaten Quickstart & Adventure

Exile Game Studios

Hollow Earth Expedition Quickstart & Adventure

Fantasy Flight Games

Black Crusade Quickstart and Adventure

Goodman Games

DCC RPG Quickstart

Green Ronin

DragonAge Quickstart

Paizo

"We Be Goblins!" Pathfinder Adventure

Paradigm Concepts

White Wolf

World of Darkness Quickstart

Wizards of the Coast

"Domain of Dread: Histhaven" D&D 4th Edition Supplement

to the box set "The Shadowfell: Gloomwrought and Beyond"

Stocks are limited, first come first served. Due to potential demand, these freebies will be limited to one per customer, so choose wisely and get down early!

I'm sorry but due to limited space in store, I won't be running any in store demonstrations this year, but check out iWARPUK for RPG and other gaming in Gloucestershire.

Ben Fardon is hoping to lose himself in other characters this afternoon

Big Game Hunting - Short stories aren’t necessarily short campaigns

In my previous article, I talked about why I thought GM’s should have a storyboard. As it comes up to when Glass Block is released (WOOOO!), I’ve been thinking more and more about player and reader experience rather than one of a writer, a GM or a designer. One of the major things I’ve hit on is that the games I enjoy most are those that I know there’s something churning away in the background. But I can’t decide if I prefer the stuff that’s driven by my character, or the stuff that I do in response to what’s going on around her.

This got me thinking about short stories. Are there any parallels in construction between the two that would work to give people an idea about running one shots?

While this feels suspiciously like stripping away the innards of a magic trick and showing people sleight of hand, one of the biggest things I learned at Uni in my first year was that character driven stories engage people more than stories driven by circumstance - and that’s the difference between short stories and short campaigns.


Short stories are often character driven, while gaming is almost always response driven – unless your character is seriously proactive. But there’s less of an issue with that in fiction – characters are almost always proactive and almost always move the story forward by their actions, whether deliberately or otherwise. One shots are the essence of this in most cases – there’s little time and a smaller story arc to deal with, but things move forward. If they don’t, the one shot feels dissatisfying and can really put a crimp on deciding whether to go back to the universe for longer games. But that’s the other half to this equation – not everything that would make a great short story would make a good one shot.

I guess one of the major drawbacks with this is it’s kind of like saying that one form of media is instantly comparable to another. Which of course they aren’t. If you’re looking for a way to understand gaming more, it might be an idea to slip into a couple of one shot games (Free RPG Day is an ideal way to get your hands on some to try, if you don’t have many) and see where your characters lead you - see if they’re doing the things that you’d expect. Then think about the same story, as a short story, and write it. It’s a fair bet that you’ll think of different ways to deal with the things you faced in the one shot, which might give you an idea for your own next games.

This week, Kai is frantically putting the finishing touches on blowing up a prison and trying to make sure Elliot gets out alive...

Big Game Hunting - Should GM’s have a storyboard?

One of my friends was in chat with me the other evening and was idly talking about gaming and ideas for games and asking about some of the stuff that I write, when we hit on one of the questions that she’d always meant to ask, but hadn’t remembered before.

Should GM’s have a storyboard?

That’s kinda like asking whether a writer should have a plot but bear with me on this.

One of the major areas players have a problem with gaming is when they’re put in a position of feeling like they’re not playing the game – they have no control and are instead being shoehorned into a story that doesn’t work for them, or anyone else in the party. In other words, their GM isn’t so much as giving them a place to play and explore as putting them into a linear story that can’t be influenced. In some cases, in other words, a rigid story isn’t a good idea. But rigid stories and storyboards aren't quite the same thing.

As a writer, I’ve spent the last seven or so years listening to one main male voice in my head. His name is Elliot and he’s the main character in seven of my books and lives in a universe with two other characters, which also have their own books. Elliot’s world or stories weren’t consciously storyboarded and unfolded as they went, but at the same time, I had this overarching ‘arc’ that was storyboarded, planned and meticulously plotted in my head. I’m sure many people would argue that you can’t do both, but I did. And as a GM I do the same thing.

Writing and designing games means that you have to have sets of storyboards in your head, but it’s a lot more flexible, because your GMs will eventually come up with the story themselves. But if you’re GMing, you’ve got to walk a very fine line – there has to be a goal, a story arc to reach for, but at the same time, you gotta give your players enough control over some of the incidents that are happening around them to ensure that they not only engage with the game, but feel like it’s positively contributing to the world around them. Only then can you be sure that your players are getting the most out of the game and are feeling good about how they move on from whatever predicament they’ve found themselves in. But, at the same time, it doesn’t mean that you’ve got do deal with your arc in a ‘linear, the players have to be involved too’ way – in fact, sometimes, the occasional element that slipped passed them (such as choosing to deal with one thing over another) makes things even more interesting. Games shouldn’t be about players being all powerful – in fact, kicking their feet out from under them occasionally because of their choices is a good thing.

Which is why I argue overarching storyboards are not only essential, but make the game more enjoyable.

This week, Kai has been starting at storyboards so much that she keeps thinking her conservatory windows are whiteboards...

Big Game Hunting - Dragon Age, Box Set 2 - PRE-ORDER OFFER

Green Ronin informed us this week that Dragon Age Box Set 2 is finally finished and has been approved by BioWare. It's at the printers right now and expected to start arriving in stores in the coming month or so!

Continuing the wonderful bricks and mortar retailer support that Green Ronin offer, they have sent me pre-order codes for Box Set 2.

If you pre-order Box Set 2 with Proud Lion and pay the non-refundable deposit of £15.00 (this is 50% of the total price, which is expected to be £30.00) then I will email you a code that you can use at the Green Ronin webstore to get the PDF edition NOW for only $5.00!

This offer is available until July 31st 2011.

Saffron Threads - Who am I, again?

I may have mentioned before that I'm a bit of an escapism addict. It's certainly part of the reason I enjoy tabletop RPGs and LARP, but it does have its downsides, namely keeping all those personalities straight and in-check.

I have a few past RPG characters that are not memorable, mostly from my early days of gaming or from a first attempt at a new system. I have two I'm very attached to but who don't get out to play because the games are on indefinite hiatus. Finally, I have two currently in play and am ready to roll up a third, all in different systems. I try to make the characters different from each other in a bid to make it easier for me to remember who I'm supposed to be being today: I don't always succeed, although I have yet to confuse anyone else in this way. I prefer to think that this is because I catch myself, rather than because I'm a rubbish roleplayer...

The first of the two on hiatus is a young, naive and somewhat flighty werewolf in a new World Of Darkness campaign, but with house-rules to the old WoD rules when the GM prefers them. She started out as a twenty-something living it up in London while working as a Parliamentary Researcher but after almost two years of play she's a scarily powerful werewolf with no paying job, sharing a ramshackle house with two mages, hanging out in the spirit world and a bar guarded by Wraiths and trying to avoid any responsibility in the decimated local pack. Oh and she has a wraith in her head: the only way she could escape the Deadlands as a werewolf after dying during her first Change was to agree to allow a wraith to guide her back. In return, he overtly and covertly pushes her to fulfil his own ends, and when he achieved them he will leave her. Allegedly...

The other hiatus character is for a post-apocalyptic free-form system run by Proud Lion's very own Ben called Cactus Land. This one was a rebellious adrenaline junkie, caring for almost nothing and no one. I have to admit, I loved this game. Because it was systemless, if there wasn't a reason in your backstory for you to be able to do something, you couldn't do it. End of. Backstory and character development is the key reason I roleplay, and the main reason I didn't get on with D&D v4 at all. As a social board game, it's good. As a roleplaying game, it sucked, and not in the good way. Back to Cactus Land: as an ex-Nascar driver and jillaroo, Lisa had many skills I do not, and her independence and nihilism meant there was no falling around persuading the party to cooperate! She still hasn't forgiven herself for almost escaping from a prison camp and hesitating when the rest of the party seemed to be in trouble, and then all being recaptured together. Really, who needs a spark of humanity with experiences like that?

Of my two current characters, Gudrun is a half-elf sorceress in a Norse setting of D&D v3.5. It's the first system I ever played but I've had mixed results on the roleplaying side of the game. I'm struggling to inhabit this character, and while there are things she will do, such as taking the dawn watch (because she follows Dellingr, father of Day and god of Dawn) and weaving in the evenings and walking with a staff (because that's what the Volva did), she doesn't have a unique personality for me. Yet...

I've mentioned Lady G before, my Curious Pastimes alchemist. She's a lovely roleplaying challenge because although she considers herself a lady "by accident of birth rather than character" she's unwilling to give up the status it brings or intentionally behave like a common peasant. So, I get to spend a weekend trying to avoid making a single smutty comment (something I have yet to achieve!) and influencing people by diplomacy rather than outright leadership, or shirking duties entirely – it's always Gin O'Clock for some players! I have a very clear sense of who she is and how she reacts, but even so, maintaining it unscripted for 16hours a day is another challenge. As a non-combatant alchemist, there's an awful lot roleplay involved in being her, so it's refreshing to take time out on a monster slot to just mindlessly hit things as the third gribbly from the left.

I'm trying out Maelstrom LARP later this year, which will see me attached to the pleasure cult, providing services in return for personal gain. And she will utterly detest nature, thus being a complete change from every other character I've played, and definitely involve me playing against my own preferences. Escapism, here I come...

This weekend, Saffron is running around being Lady G, then skipping off into the Mediterranean sunset for a well-deserved rest and cocktails on a beach, followed by some gentle sightseeing.