 J. R. R. Tolkien is pretty much the granddaddy of fantasy roleplaying games. That title comes from his enormous influence on how we see the Fantasy genre today. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, rich in its languages, cultures and topography, is the root for a huge number of imitation worlds. It’s not by accident that Dungeons & Dragons has elves, dwarves, and halflings; Gygax’s initial wargame was spun out of the genre that Tolkien founded.
Being that he’s kind of a big deal, I wondered if Tolkien might have something to contribute to roleplaying games in general. I dug up an essay he wrote called “On Fairy Stories” that gives a few of the reasons he thinks fairy tales are important and good for human beings. His insights also apply pretty well to fantasy roleplaying games. Here are five ways that fairy tales are good for you, and some ideas about how this dovetails with fantasy roleplaying games. 1) Fantasy Allows Us To Explore New Worlds Tolkien makes the case that fairy stories, which I will refer to as capital-f Fantasy, satisfy a number of fundamental human cravings and desires. The first desire is to make imaginary things become real. One of the fundamental attractions of fiction is the ability to participate in a secondary world that has different laws from our own. The purpose of Fantasy is for someone to become what Tolkien calls a "subcreator" of a world and to share it with others. Good Fantasy is detailed and rich enough that it creates 'Secondary Belief,' the sense that the sub-created world is a real place. Good Fantasy is also the result of a cooperation between the author and the reader that results in both being enchanted. There are clearly parallels to this in roleplaying games. Roleplaying games are basically the definition of Fantasy: a cooperative creation and exploration of a secondary world. It was interesting, also, that Tolkien mentioned “different laws.” The rules systems in roleplaying games lend a sense of realism to the game world because there are limitations to what characters can do. Though too many rules can be clunky, sometimes you need a bit of crunch to develop Secondary Belief. 2) Fantasy Encourages The Recovery Of Wonder Good Fantasy can reorient our perspective. We might look at real life a bit differently after reading a great story. Ordinary things might hold wonder for us again. What does a hike in the mountains mean after reading about a man who became one? Or perhaps the people we meet bear a resemblance to characters from a story in the way they help or hinder us. To be amazed is to be like a child in the best sense, to see life with new eyes. Fantasy can also inspire the wonder that comes of seeing something altogether new. Not only do old familiar things become ‘wonder-full,’ but Fantasy helps us to dust off our sense of wonder for new things, which adults have often put on the shelf. This isn’t something I had previously considered when playing roleplaying games, but I have to say that it definitely applies. A good game can offer the thrill of discovery and the excitement of victory, though you’re technically only sitting around the table dropping polyhedrons. Even if the only thing recovered is a love for playing games and make-believe, that’s a win. 3) Fantasy Is A Kind Of Escape Old man Tolkien comes down pretty hard on people who dismiss Fantasy as escapism. He lists plenty of things that suck, things that people want to escape from: hunger, thirst, poverty, pain, sorrow, injustice. He further says that even if you don’t face big problems like these, it can offer an escape from other inevitable human limitations: not being able to fly, not knowing the future or the past, being unable to communicate with animals, being stuck in a body that will get old... In some ways, Fantasy can provide an escape even from the idea of death! Finally, Fantasy enables us to say, “this world is not the way it could be,” or even, “this world is not the way it should be.” It can help us to grieve problems in life, or give us a chance to reflect on them. This kind of self-reflection on heroism or virtue may also inspire us to make changes in our life. No doubt this rings true for many roleplaying game enthusiasts. It can be very satisfying to go from the grey world of office politics to a black-and-white, good-vs-evil reality where problems can be solved with a club! At its best, though, roleplaying “escapism” helps us to become better people. Consequences in game don’t actually have real stakes, which allows us to practice being a bit more brave, a bit more curious, and a bit more persuasive. All such habits have real world value. 4) Fantasy Consoles Us, Telling Us That Everything Will Turn Out All Right Tolkien argued that one essential characteristic of the fairy-story was the happy ending. The final moment, when all the problems are solved often provides the reader with a glimpse of pure joy that is somehow greater than can be described. A joy that is “beyond the walls of the world,” hinting at something greater, maybe even sacred. In the end, don’t we all want a happy ending? It seems to be what we are meant for, in a way. However, not all roleplaying games have a happy ending, let’s just lay that out there now. When you do wrap things up with a neat happily-ever-after, you get a taste of the joy that Tolkien was talking about. It can be as good as, or better than, the ending of a movie or a book itself. It can be hard to design games with a happy ending while maintaining a sense of urgency or uncertainty, but it should definitely be a consideration when planning a game. 5) Fantasy Connects Us To What Is Essentially Human The idea that everyone wants a happy ending is just one of the ways that Fantasy taps into our humanity. Fairy tales let us see into an archaic past which, by its unfamiliarity, allows us to see what is common amongst us. Fantasy stories reflect the deepest human desires for justice, resolution, adventure, peril, triumph, the victory of good over evil, and vivid beauty. Tolkien suggests that fairy tales give us a peek at the building blocks of what makes us human. Things like the importance of doing the right thing, even if it works to our detriment. Respecting prohibitions. Keeping promises. Being honest and kind. Stories about nameless people from 3000 years ago got thrown into one big pot of soup where now they rub shoulders with princes, princesses, and the gods. Even if fairy-stories are not historical, in the strictest sense, they are broadly historical; that is, the stories probably happened to someone, even if the real names have been lost over time. The storytellers tell stories that have happened to familiar people, but they recast the characters as gods. At its very best, this is what fantasy roleplaying games can bring us. We connect to what is best about our humanity (honor, heroism, sacrifice) and play it out as a reminder that we can always aspire to more. Roleplaying games are a great venue to practice the virtues that we hope to develop in our own lives. I hope you can take that and run with it, bringing your games up to the next level! Landrew is a full-time educator, part-time art enthusiast. He applies his background in literature and fine arts to his favourite hobby (roleplaying games) because the market for a background in the Fine Arts is very limited. He writes this blog on company time under a pseudonym. Long live the Corporation! Picture Reference: http://mentalfloss.com/article/59736/10-things-you-might-not-know-about-jrr-tolkien  Something I've learned about myself is that creating backstory is my favorite part of character creation. You get to choose their life experience and place it in the world. Backstories are vital to characters in all creative writing. For example; If you look closely, movie script writers will always have a backstory written for the character even if that character isn’t in the movie. It gives the actors (or in this case our players) the ability to understand who the character is and how to play them. So, let's talk backstory, shall we?
1) Backstory Inspires Your GM As a player you are vital to the world building process. The world is literally being built for you and around you. A player should put the same amount of work into a character that the GM puts into a world. And though backstory is only a small piece of the symbiosis, it allows the GM and player to easily collaborate. We know how invested our world builders get; railroading is a growing pain of gaming. I know for me it helps me think outside of the box. One of my players placed a city in his backstory and now it’s a major place in my setting. You’ll get them thinking about your character, you’ll get them thinking about how to shape their world. 2) Creating In-Character Bonds Creating our backstories allows for the party to connect and grow as characters. It brings a depth to the table allowing players to have an ultimate understanding of why they act the way they do. A group that has a rich array of roots also encourages roleplay when players want to learn about each other’s characters. The unique dialogue that arises from this creates a strong, in-character bond. In the longest campaign I have ever been a part of, I played a character that went through a drastic morality shift. I had suffered a loss in game because of my backstory, my character was emotionally defeated, but my party did everything they could to pick him up. It was an empowering moment for this character because he became less selfish. He never saw these people as friends until this moment. They were only tools, but because of a small background detail, our relationship had changed. 3) Practice Becoming A Better Player Character backstory is an easy problem with a complicated solution. The first two points work in tandem with this concept to make you a better player. Putting time into your backstory is a big investment, but has a pay off well worthwhile. Compare your game to a spider’s web that you weave with your GM and other players. Plucking a strand in the web you created can cause an interesting vibration. Messing around with structures will only increase your understanding of how these games can work, which can lead to more fun. Isn’t fun the point of our hobby? I believe the backstory of a character is the most important part to a game. Paying attention to how you build your character’s backstory allows you to create characters that can do great things. I will leave you with a warning though: everyone in the hobby has different levels of investment. Follow the golden rule; know who you’re playing with. How important is backstory to you? Benjamin Witunsky, artist, writer and nerd savant. Cofounder of the NerdMantle Podcast available on Soundcloud, Itunes and Google Play Music. Image Source: The Hollywood Reporter  Hey, Jim here! Before Frankie gets started, I wanted to remind you that High Level Games is bringing you game content and commentary absolutely free, as well as providing a home and launching point for a slew of great creators! If you want to help our endeavors, we'd love it if you stopped by our Patreon to show your support. Of course, if you'd like a little something for your hard earned money, you could always pick up one of our fine game products as well.
Greetings traveler! I’m sorry to hear about your loss. I understand one of your companions went missing in Lamordia, and you believe the shadowy Adam to be responsible. I was relieved to receive your letter asking for my advice on how to proceed; I had begun to worry you no longer had need of me! Fortunately for you, I’ve dealt with Adam (as well as his deranged creator) personally. Since encountering Adam, I’ve tangled with other creatures of his ilk, and discerned several common threads between them. 1) The Difference In other lands, the ability to animate the inanimate is a function of powerful magic and expert application. Within the Mists, however, the power to bestow quasi-life to one's creations comes more easily (if not as reliably). Although the techniques vary wildly, they all require a creator to spend an inordinate amount of time, attention, and money in the pursuit of their creation. A great deal of information about the varieties of golem creation can be found in Van Richten's seminal (if unoriginally named) Van Richten's Guide to the Created. What the good doctor fails to note is the distinction between ‘mundane’ constructs, the mindless automata that follow only the directions of their creators, and the malignant intelligence of those constructs touched (some might say tainted) by the Dark Powers. Van Richten’s successors, the Weathermay twins, have dubbed the more dangerous variety dread golems. While the rules were written with 2e in mind, the lore, background, and cost guidelines in Van Richten's Guide are suitable for any edition. Rules for dread golems can be found on p. 190 of the Ravenloft Core Rulebook. 2) The Obsession What a sufficiently motivated creator lacks in magical potential, the Dark Powers may sometimes fill in. What seems to attract their attention in this regard is obsession: the desire to finish their work at the expense of everything else. Bringing their creation to life may not even be their literal intent. Consider Ernst Bederim: an acolyte at the Great Cathedral in Levkarest and a bright young artist who worked exclusively in portraits of leaded glass. His magnum opus was to be a portrait of Ezra to rival the centerpiece of Sainte Mere de Larmes. His passion led him to neglect his duties to the faith (at least one brother suffered grievous injuries restoring a fresco that Ernst was supposed to have done), and eventually he went missing altogether. He was found sliced to pieces a few weeks later, but his nearly-completed masterpiece has not been seen since. The animation of this art piece into a Dread Golem (for that is what I believe transpired) was not born of a literal desire to bring life, only a figurative desire, to make his artwork "come alive" as it were, a desire which the Dark Powers saw fit to grant. If the glass portrait of Ezra truly does stalk the Great Cathedral, then statistics for stained-glass golems can be found in the Monster Manual II. 3) The Connection The power to create life is the province of the gods alone, and mankind has but a single way to achieve this end: the way the gods intended. The magically potent and driven may attempt to usurp this power, but their creations, from the basest homunculus to the most powerful golem, remain a part of them in a potent and fundamental way. I believe that the soul of the creation is a piece of the creator's own soul, a fragment they have torn loose with their perverse obsession and imparted in the construct, like a cutting taken from a tree. Consider Adam: his own creator, Dr. Mordenheim, and he suffer an intense shared connection. Prick one, and the other feels the needle. (But be warned: I know from experience that neither can perish whilst the other endures.) Adam is even widely believed (by those who know of such things) to be Lamordia's Dark Lord. So why does his domain, and his alone, not reflect his own history and psyche? The answer is that he is not, no matter what he might think, an independent creature: he is merely an extension of Mordenheim's own soul. This is why Lamordia is modeled after Mordenheim's influence, and not Adam's. Frankie may be correct here: if Adam and Mordenheim truly are one soul, it would make their dual curses make sense. Both are chief among the damned in Lamordia, and while Mordenheim's influence predominates, only Adam wields the supernatural prowess of the Dark Lord. For more information about Lamordia and its environs, see the Ravenloft Gazetteer: Vol. II. 4) The Imperfect Some powers are not for humankind to possess, a lesson the dread golems' half-lives bring resoundingly home. Each of these creatures possesses a number of tiny flaws, which Van Richten dubs zeitgeibers, as if to underscore their creators' inability to impart real life. I encountered a jeweler in Hazlan once, a Rashemi woman purported to have the occasional prophetic dream. She made such wonderful trinkets from crystal, etched in the shapes of animals both real and mystical. When the Mulan noble she served became pregnant, the artist worked night and day fashioning a delicate crystalline fairy to watch over the child, for she had sensed a great darkness that wished the Mulan harm. The noblewoman miscarried, and when she discovered what her servant had been making, she cursed the artist for her superstition and had her hanged. The crystalline fairy did not take this affront lightly: before departing into the night, she killed every Mulan child in the household. To this day, the crystal fairy is incapable of passing a sleeping person without doing them an ill turn, which may be as innocuous as stealing an article of clothing, or as vicious as cold blooded murder. The crystal fairy has been sighted all across the core, often posing as a mundane piece of jewelry or statuary. Details on crystal golems can be found in Denizens of Darkness. 5) The Malevolent While some dread golems, like the crystal fairy, are born shortly before their creator's demise, virtually all of those that are not eventually attempt to destroy their creator. Some may attempt to do so out of a perverse mockery of love, desiring to possess their beloved even at the cost of the creator's life, but most grow to despise their 'parent.' Some profess anger at having been made for servitude, some outrage at being created imperfectly. Some, like Adam, cite personal conflicts that exploded into a lifetime of treacheries. I believe that the truth is that the same part of the creator's soul which animates the golem is the part of themselves that know what they have done is wrong, and that they deserve to be punished for it. The act of creation purges them of this part of themselves, and the Dark Powers give it the ability to act on its dark desires. For such creatures and their creators, life takes on one of two forms: either the creator (or sometimes, much more rarely, the creature) flees, while the other pursues them with the same relentless obsession that brought about the golem's unnatural existence in the first place, or else (like Dr. Mordenheim) the creator proves too powerful or influential for the construct to easily destroy, and they lurk on the fringes of their creator's territory, plotting elaborate vengeance. Adam's Wrath is only one of the Dark Lord of Lamordia's elaborate revenge schemes. Check it or the Gazetteer II for more possible ways for Adam to involve the PCs in his vengeful war against the mad doctor who created him. Conclusion If you take only a single piece of advice from me regarding your plan to rescue your companion from Adam's clutches, it is this: don't. My own brush with Adam and Dr. Mordenheim cost me a lung, the life of my sister, and the soul of a dear friend, and I consider myself to have gotten away lightly. In the best of scenarios, your friend is already dead. At worst, they are irrevocably...altered. However, I know you well enough to know you're unlikely to heed my warnings. You'll risk your life for that of your companion's no matter what I say, so as your (distant) friend and occasional mentor, I offer you this additional bit of wisdom: Trust Adam not at all. Trust Mordenheim less. Good luck, and happy hunting. Frankie Drakeson, Lord Mayor of Carinford-Halldon Frankie Drakeson is a retired rifleman and the current mayor of Carinford-Halldon in Mordent. He is married to Gwendolyn Drakeson, the granddaughter of Nathan Timothy. Jim Stearns is a deranged hermit from the swamps of Southern Illinois. In addition to writing for the Black Library, he puts pen to paper for High Level Games and Quoth the Raven. His mad scribblings can frequently be found in anthologies like Fitting In or Selfies from the End of the World, by Mad Scientist Journal. Follow him on Twitter @jcstearnswriter, or listen to Don, Jon, & Dragons, his podcast. Picture Reference: http://www.lomion.de/cmm/golervfl.php  HLG Reviews: How To Write Adventure Modules That Don't Suck
Publisher: Goodman Games System: System Neutral Editor’s Note: Enjoy reading articles about your favorite hobby and engaging with fellow gamers? We do too, but hosting and producing our site isn’t free. Please consider visiting our Patreon page and supporting us at any amount. We put every dollar back into the site and its production, and your help has allowed us to have certain paid article months for our contributors. Thank you for your continued readership and your support! -David Horwitz, Blog Manager Now here’s a book I’d been looking forward to for quite a while. In my short time writing for this site, I’ve made no secret of my esteem for Goodman Games, and that’s due in no small part to their adventure modules. Whether we’re talking about Dungeon Crawl Classics, Age of Cthulhu, or Fifth Edition Fantasy, they’re always packed with inventive new creatures, genre tropes turned on their ears, and just plain off the wall creativity that always shows me a brand new level of what fantasy RPGs can really do. Not to mention they’re a great example of how much potential often gets overlooked and unrealized, buried beneath a mountain of linear thinking and repeated ideas. If I want anyone’s advice on writing adventures, it’s theirs. HTWAMTDS wasn’t what I thought it would be, not in a bad way, just different. It’s essentially a collection of essays written by some of the most experienced RPG writers in the business, each one ending with an “Encounter” that tries to provide an example of the advice in action. Many of the writers such as Michael Curtis and Brendan LaSalle will need no introduction if you’re familiar with the work Goodman Games offers, and though you won’t find Chris Perkins or Monte Cook here, names like Skip Williams and James M. Ward should prick your ears if you know the history of your hobby. As the word Modules in the title might tip you off, the absolute dead center bullseye of the target audience are aspiring authors interested in designing adventures for publication, but the vast majority is equally valuable for GM’s who just want advice for their home games. Going in, I wasn’t quite sure how to review this. The value of advice is subjective by its very nature, especially in a field like Game Mastering where everyone formulates their own methods, philosophies, and opinions anyway. Right off the bat, stylistic differences were glaringly apparent even between the individual contributors, wafting from the pages like each chapter’s unique cologne. A lot of the essays are written with an obvious old school gaming mentality in mind, which again, won’t come as a surprise to anyone familiar with GG’s work. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I think there’s quite a lot classic RPGs got right that was unfortunately lost with modern innovation, namely that classic RPGs seemed more focused on facilitating an interactive fantastical adventure, whereas more modern incarnations lean towards the concept of the game being a “game” first and foremost, with a heavier reliance on mechanics and power balance. However, there are some parts of the philosophy I’m not so keen on, such as the story-light approach left over from the White Box days when D&D’s default setting was a hole in the ground filled with orcs and goblins. I got into the hobby to tell interactive stories, and I need a strong narrative to maintain my interest. So when the venerable Jobe Bittman (writer of a litany of Dungeon Crawl Classics material and co-writer of Towers Two for Lamentations of the Flame Princess) extols the virtues of keeping an adventure light on context so the PCs can forge their own narrative out of the elements placed before them, I’m inclined to believe that I wouldn’t enjoy campaigning at his table for an extended length of time. Some of the contributors give completely different advice for the same issue. Mike Breault (writer and editor at TSR from ‘84 to ‘89) will tell you that the best way to keep players invested in your adventure is to offer them lots of decisions. Speaking from experience, you need to be invested in the first place to care about decisions. On the rare occasion that I get to play a PC in a campaign, if my interest in the adventure starts to wane, (usually because it gets bogged down in repetitive, pointless combat encounters) I honestly couldn’t give a crap if we go left, right, or through the ogre’s butt, I’ll let those who do care make the call and keep a healing spell ready. Stephen Chenault, one half of the duo that created Troll Lord Games (most famous for Castles and Crusades) would suggest that the best way to keep players invested is to introduce conflict to give them something to do. Again, I refer you to pointless, repetitive encounters. If you were to ask me, I would tell you that the best way to keep players invested in your campaign is to give them a reason to care. (Draw on backstories or character motivations, let them build a relationship with an NPC and then put them in peril, give them something to aspire to like a modicum of political power, there’s a million ways to do it but busy work isn’t one of them) Regardless of stylistic decisions, however, there’s a LOT to love between these pages. It’s easy to pick out the advice that doesn’t work for me only because it stands out so much against a tapestry of extremely insightful and useful direction from veterans RPG writers. This review would be five times as long if I sat here to elucidate everything that does work, but to try to do as much justice to the product as I can, I’ll list a few highlights. Logical First Contact by Timothy Brown is without exaggeration the best advice I’ve seen for creating your own monsters, not because it helps you stat them out, but because it lays out a thought process for figuring out the ecology of these creatures, which in turn informs their unique abilities and functions. The chapter specifies “space aliens” but it works just as well for terrestrial creatures that spring from the Game Master’s imagination. Besides, if you think aliens don’t belong in a fantasy RPG you just aren’t embracing the creative possibilities of The Weird, my friend. Raison D’etre by Christopher Clark lays out one of the most important rules for maintaining player immersion, and Casey Christofferson’s Making A Villain brings forth one of the most fundamental truths that I wish more aspiring storytellers understood: Bad guys don’t see themselves as bad guys, they think their actions are justified. Also, if you are interested in creating modules for publication, Joseph Goodman’s insight into how professional publishers evaluate submissions will send the value of this book into the stratosphere. As stated, each chapter ends with an “Encounter” that tries to translate the subject of the chapter into practical mechanics in action. Not every single one is usable, some of them don’t even have mechanics, but this is essentially a huge pile of content you can pillage for your home games. With a little elbow grease and some creativity, quite a few of them can be extended into full blown adventures. So now the book of advice from RPG veterans comes stapled to a pile of adventure seeds, monsters, and traps. It’s exceedingly difficult to not find something usable here. So, do you need this book? Well, no, but what does it mean to need something in this hobby? You could play D&D forever with just the free Basic Rules, right? It would be far better to ask, will this book help you be a better Game Master? Will it help you create better adventures? Almost certainly. If that’s worth the price to you, you won’t be disappointed. Just remember to read with a discerning eye. Chaz Lebel is a fiction author and member of Caffeinated Conquests, a YouTube channel dedicated to nerd comedy and tabletop gaming. He and his team once produced some promotional videos for High Level Games that they probably wish they could forget. Chaz can be found on Twitter @CafConIsOn Picture Reference: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1409961192/how-to-write-adventure-modules-that-dont-suck  We'd like to thank Craig Campbell of NerdBurger Games for talking to us today. He's created some great games in the past, including Murders & Acquisitions, and has a long RPG freelancer resume including Dungeon magazine and Pathfinder Society adventures. I first heard of NerdBurger Games on the podcast, Podcast: The Wreckening by The Wrecking Crew. They were talking about M&A quite a bit at one point, and it sounds like a fantastic game. You can find CAPERS on Kickstarter.
Craig, did I miss anything you think our readers should know about? That covers things pretty well. 1) CAPERS, tell us how this game is different? What's the setting and why would I want to run this game? CAPERS is a super-powered game of gangsters in the Roaring Twenties. You play gangsters and bootleggers making their fortunes in a world that’s sort of coming into its own following the Great War. The setting is one of action, adventure, virtue, and vice where characters are risking their lives to get rich and flaunt their power. Alternatively, you can portray members of law enforcement who are fighting what is, essentially, a losing battle. They’re understaffed and underfunded and illegal booze (as well as gambling, prostitution, and racketeering) are everywhere. For them, it’s more about fighting the battle than it is winning the war. The game delves into an era that isn’t represented in quite this way very often. The gangster heyday of the 1920s, at least as portrayed in CAPERS, is a romanticized ideal of the decade. It’s filled with colorful characters, action, and intrigue which is further “ramped up” by the existence of people with extraordinary abilities. 2) Instead of dice, you use cards for the resolution mechanic in CAPERS. Tell us what your thought process was in choosing this mechanic. Another game I love, Ki-Khanga, also uses cards, so I'm seeing something I'd hazard to call a trend in the game community toward trying something other than dice. While the world of CAPERS is built around Prohibition, illegal gambling is a prominent aspect in the organized crime of the era. I was looking for a hook in the mechanical sense that would compliment the narrative hook of gangsters with super-powers. I’d worked in dice systems before and created my own for Murders & Acquisitions. My mind floated to playing cards and I toyed with some ideas. Ultimately, I settled into a card-flipping mechanic that plays as sort of a gambling, press-your-luck system. The characters are taking risks in their lives…they’re gambling with their lives. The players are, in turn, using a mechanical system that makes each trait check a bit of a gamble as they make active choices about whether to keep the card they have or flip for a new one, hoping to be rewarded, but risking failure. 3) If you had one reason to suggest someone back the Kickstarter, what would that one thing be? If you dig supers, you know that there are a lot of supers games out there. Many of them are built on the modern day and the well-known tropes of superHEROES. CAPERS is one of a handful of supers games that flips the expected dynamics of supers games into something different. And it touches on an era that doesn’t get a lot of love in RPGs outside of noir and Cthulhu games. 4) I know a lot of the art on the Kickstarter demonstrates a cross-section of people represented and I take that as a good sign for the product overall. How, if at all, are you hoping to make the 1920's era of CAPERS an inclusive product? The RPG hobby, industry, and community are important to me. For a long time, it was spun through with LOTS of straight, cis, white guys. And many of the games were representative of that. In the past several years, there has been a strong movement to make the hobby more inclusive, to welcome ALL types of people. To give voice to all types of designers. To give all types of players an experience they can enjoy and that they identify with or at least that invites them in. I feel there are only things to be gained by broadening the appeal of RPGs in all ways. CAPERS certainly has its share of white guy NPCs, particularly because there are so many well-known historic figures of the era that are white guys. But it’s also filled with gender-swaps, race-flips, and a variety of other NPCs that fall outside the white guy range. It’s an alternate history game that supposes, “Wouldn’t it be great if every type of person could be a nefarious gangster or a stalwart law-dog?” And the text, NPCs, and art reflect that. 5) Do you anticipate creating any other supplements or other products for either M&A or CAPERS? Each of these games are intended to be standalone games with everything you need to play in one book. I’ve created a little Holiday Bonus PDF for M&A and I’m doing a monthly, 1-page PDF supplement for M&A called M&A Memos. I expect CAPERS will see some simple support products in the future. I’m not averse to offering larger support and game/setting expansion products, but it’s more a matter of whether the game’s popularity and fanbase can support it. I’m open to all possibilities, but I have to see how CAPERS sells first. 6) What's the next thing for NerdBurger Games? I’m about 90% sure that the next game will be Die Laughing. That’s a short-play, no-prep, GM-less story game where everyone portrays a character in a horror comedy movie. Everyone is going to die. It’s just a matter of when and how funny you can make it. The game features a reducing dice pool mechanic that functions as a countdown to the character’s death as well as ways for you to remain involved in and influencing the story even after your character is dead…or a zombie…or a sexy vampire. Beyond that, I have an idea for a very simple family game that parents can play with their kids. And there’s nugget of an idea for a mid-apocalypse game with a very unique twist that I think people will dig. Josh is the intrepid Chief Operations Officer of High Level Games. With 20 years of playing rpgs, Josh started with Mind's Eye Theater LARPs and loves the World of Darkness. He runs, www.keepontheheathlands.com to support his gaming projects. Josh is the administrator of the Inclusive Gaming Network on Facebook. He’s running a Changing Breeds game. He’s a serious advocate for inclusive gaming spaces, a father, and a graduate from the International Peace and Conflict Resolution graduate program at American University in Washington, D.C. You can also find Josh’s other published adventures here and here.  Our new supers campaign is not my first. In fact, it’s not my first time with the titular system either. I’ve played a few, and each one attempts to accomplish roughly the same feat. Mutants and Masterminds 3rd Edition, hereafter referred to as M&M, proves to be a cut above the rest. I am therefore most certainly glad we’ve returned to the system. So glad, in fact, that I’ve laid out four aspects that make it truly super.
1) One System, Unlimited Powers All powers operate within the same, unifying system. That means that if your character wants to poison people with a look while another PC wants to take over minds, the system operates nearly identically. Each is an Affliction, just with different outcomes. Even attacking a enemy follows a similar ruleset. With the aforementioned afflictions, the target makes a save or suffers the intended effects. With attacks, the target makes a save (albeit with a different target number) or suffers levels of damage. Even healing uses these rules, but in reverse. Other, stranger effects are oftentimes even easier, especially if they enhance the character. Flight and super speed just require a glance at a chart to check how far you can travel in a round; no checks required. For this system, everyone just needs a d20, their power descriptions, and the luck of the roll. 2) Combat With Options Womping on villains in M&M feels satisfying, creatively so. In an effort to replicate the comic book experience, the creators caused death to become a difficult state to produce. Therefore, heroes will have to use solutions beyond “attacking the darkness” to defeat their foes. While the forces of good and evil will certainly trade blows, it is the canny side that will be victorious. It’s easy to roll to hit, but if you’re facing an immortal gunslinger, you’re better off using the disarm option, or better yet, the smash option to break his weapon permanently. You can trip speedsters, stun shapeshifters, or set up for a combo attack on a big boss by aiding your allies. All the possibilities listed above are accomplishable by mere mortals; think then what you can do with a vast array of superpowers at your behest. 3) Versatile Characters Heroes (and villains) are created from the same cloth: power points. These little potent bits form every mechanically important detail of each character. They are used to buy everything: abilities, skills, superpowers, and even gadgets. Even minor characters are built from power points. This system ensures that Batman-esque crime fighters are just as viable as flight-enabled Kryptonian sons. Power level is the only other limiting factor, and it forces players to make more rounded characters and not tip the scales too far in the combat department. Your character can have any array of skills and powers, with any number of extras and features that make them truly unique. Add that final touch of flair and a rad costume, and you’ve got your very own comic book superhero. 4) The Right Feel Most import of all, I believe, M&M manages to capture that comic book feeling. Each system is crafted and refined to deliver the experience of fighting crime (or committing it) just like your favorite characters from any comic’s era. Want a grittier, deadlier story? There’s a fix for that. You’d rather play in the Golden Age with all the catchphrases and wacky onomatopoeia? There’s a supplement for that. There are plenty of other ways to play too, easily enough to satisfy the most hardcore comic book fans. M&M has developed the right system and supplements to replicate the heady highs we feel when watching our favorite superhero films or reading about the exploits of the caped characters we love. I’ve played other superhero systems and had plenty of fun, but none have come close to offering the breadth and depth that M&M brings to the table, all while keeping it simple. If you can’t tell already, I recommend the system highly, yet not exclusively. Tell me about your favorite superhero system and why it ‘Kapows’ the competition, and check out our other articles about M&M for different perspectives. David Horwitz is a gamer and freelance writer/editor with an obsession for exploring new forms of leisure. If you’re looking for an inquisitive mind and a deft hand, or just want to chat about gaming, contact him at www.davidhorwitzwrites.com/contact . Picture Reference: https://greenroninstore.com/collections/mutants-masterminds  Many RPGs deal with life and death, the biggest stakes for your character. Sometimes the risk is in a private duel in a back alley, but more often we’re thinking about melee, small groups or even armies clashing in a noisy, terrifying, violent storm of chaos with lives in the balance.
Such is the like to thin the veil between the living and the dead. So many moments from passing through that veil could have some very striking effects on reality, on what the living perceive, or even what the dying see as they pass through the veil. A recent episode of Vikings, the TV series on the History channel, did the best job I’ve seen of exploring this with a culture who truly believed in the gods and in the glory of battle. Let’s examine some ways that the battlefield can get weird for the player characters. 1) My Life Flashed Before My Eyes! Death and near-death are the same thing in many ways. Those who have experience either of them and lived to tell about it talk of their life flashing before their eyes. This would be a great way to have a supernatural or weird experience for one of your characters without dooming them to die to have it happen. It could happen as the killing stroke is descending. Before the blow lands (or deflects off armor) the character has a series of visions and only afterward do you determine their fate. The visions should tell their story from the most impressionable moments in childhood, young adult years, and beyond. When did they first kill? Who was their first love? What were their greatest moments of achievement and deepest failings or tragedies? Tell their story and spin it as epic as possible to infuse this next die roll with dramatic energy. 2) The Dead Came For Me In the midst of battle with life and death all around the character might have visions of people they know but who were long dead. The appearance of their parents or ancestors might beckon them to pass through the veil into the welcoming arms of family. Even a friend newly dead elsewhere on the battlefield might urge them down a path to ‘elsewhere’ to escape harm. Perhaps these are mischievous or simply cruel spirits masquerading as those the character might trust. If their urging is heeded, the character might step into the path of a killing sword or axe, sending them to the lands of the dead when they might not have gone otherwise. If the battle is being fought on a field of past battles, the chances of such interference from the dead is much greater. Personally I would never be explicit with the players regarding the veracity of their characters’ visions; whether they are the actual spirits of people they knew, or evil spirits of manipulation. It serves to preserve some of the mystery and wonder of your setting. 3) I Am Changed! There is such power in the death happening all around that supernatural forces manifest themselves. The battlefield may begin to look haunted, with skeletons fighting each other or even the bodies of the newly slain. Odd lights, shadows, and mists may penetrate the atmosphere and great chills or heat flash over the combatants. They might meet odd people or creatures walking unconcerned through the death and bloodshed. Visions of the impossible or bizarre could occur and the player character be swept up in transformative magics. After the battle, they might discover their hair has turned white, they have aged, or suffered some other physical change. Their sense of their native tongue might change to a language they never spoke in their life. Nagging injuries or scars from disease might be washed away. A missing limb might be restored or a healthy hand lost. More serious transformations involve new abilities such as spellcasting or magical powers. Gifts such as foresight or the ability to know when others are lying might play into a greater purpose. They might have been imbued with these powers by a great spirit from beyond the veil. So chosen, they feel a great purpose as well, bent on achieving the goal of the spirit who gave the gifts. Someone might have to die in vengeance. A king or great person might need to be saved from their enemies. A monster who slew what became the great spirit might need to be hunted and slain itself. The demands of the spirit may not be reasonable (“Slay every member of the Thuava clan!”) but should certainly encourage the receiver to new lands and new adventures. 4) I Was Already Dead Not everyone makes it out alive from a melee, obviously. True, player characters are the heroes, the named roles who appear to wade through battle without consequence, their every weapon stroke a killing blow. That said, even they can be felled by an arrow from nowhere or the master stroke of their vilest nemesis. In RPGs it isn’t really fair to ‘fate’ someone to die unless this has been a big build-up for the character and the player would find it dramatically correct. So this version comes into play after circumstances kill the character. A series of visions play out as if they had survived the battle, made it home to family or friends, breathed in the sweet air of the morning dawn, and the like. The ‘reveal’ would be that they are already dead on the field. You might make this a representation of how they journey to the next life, however their religion may define their mind’s inability to accept death for a time. If done powerfully enough, this might even herald their remaining in the area as a ghost, trying to go through the steps of this continued life even though they did not survive to live it. They might be confused as to why they are still hanging around this battlefield and angered as they try to get home and fail. That sets up a quest for their companions or even strangers to find his body and take it to his home for burial, giving him peace. Great battles turn tides in war and the conflicts of nations and kingdoms. In terms of roleplaying, they can be a challenge when the heroes aren’t the focus of the action. I recommend bringing something extra and very personal to the table for each character by letting your battles get a little weird. Jim Davenport founded Dragonlaird Gaming Studios in 2005 as a channel for his original tabletop RPG work. He’s an accomplished freelance writer with Knights of the Dinner Table Magazine (as a columnist) from Kenzerco, Margaret Weis Productions (Serenity, Battlestar Galactica, Cortex), and many others. He published Savage Characters Volume 1 a couple years ago and has plans to release a series of Savage Adventures soon. You can find his website at www.dragonlairdgaming.com. Picture Reference: https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.-vR_vMKZ-U4fg2_pIR2aXwHaE8&pid=Api  Trust me, I love to write and I edit for other folks on a regular basis. That doesn’t mean I should edit my own writing. In fact, I should never do it. Yet, I find myself doing so on a regular basis and every time I end up making mistakes that hurt the professionalism of my work. So, below are three reasons I think you should get an editor. If you are a game creator, a fan writer, a professional, or anyone else that ends up writing about RPGs, you need an editor.
1) You’ll Miss The Obvious One of my biggest mistakes is dropping an article. A random the, an, a, or whatever destroys a sentence. And if you forget one? Looks like crap, your writing does. If you don’t have an editor to work with on your writing, at least give anything you’ve put together 2-3 days before you review. This still won't be perfect, however. Having an editor, someone who won't assume that each sentence works as intended, review your piece will help it appear more professionally written. 2) You Hurt Your Ideas You’re on a roll, you’ve written an awesome adventure that you are excited to share with the world. Then you end up cutting out a sentence that needs to be there, just to make an entire module make some sort of sense. Trust me, you’ll get comments from your readers for years afterward about that one missing sentence. They’ll tear apart a module that was otherwise amazing for this seemingly minor infraction. They aren’t doing it to be jerks either; when you drop something that has to be in a sentence you are sentencing yourself to this hell. I’ve done it. Thankfully, in the day of digital products you can update a PDF after the fact and fix your mistakes. Woe betide if you put that into print though. Edit, get another editor, and get a final editing pass to help you make sure that you’ve got everything covered and your concept appears to be what you are saying it should be. 3) Comma Issues This, is, my, biggest issue. I don’t try to Shatner comma, but I often end up finding out that I’ve created the perfect script for Captain Kirk without realizing it. The comma is a wonderful piece of punctuation, as is the parenthesis, period (full stop), exclamation point, and the apostrophe. All of these are awesome. Yes! Even the exclamation point! That said, you might find yourself overusing, underusing, or just plain ignoring the need for the various forms of punctuation that sit around wanting, waiting, hoping to be helpful. You’re not perfect. The gaming world isn’t perfect, the RPG industry is not perfect. You’ll make mistakes. If you’re a consumer of games, you’ll spot these mistakes and you might find yourself asking how the company you love could have made this glaring mistake. Trust me, you’d be shocked how many times you can review something and still find a mistake. I used to joke about page XX in my favorite game line books, but at this point I have an immense amount of empathy for those making it to print. Should it happen? No. Will it inevitably and frustrate you for the next decade? If you’re like me, yes. If you’d like to get some editing support, reach out to these folks: Tara Clapper: The Geek Initiative: [email protected] High Level Games: Yes, we do editing too. [email protected] Ever After Editing: https://everafterediting.blogspot.com/ Josh is the intrepid Chief Operations Officer of High Level Games. With 20 years of playing rpgs, Josh started with Mind's Eye Theater LARPs and loves the World of Darkness. He runs, www.keepontheheathlands.com to support his gaming projects. Josh is the administrator of the Inclusive Gaming Network on Facebook. He’s running a Changing Breeds game. He’s a serious advocate for inclusive gaming spaces, a father, and a graduate from the International Peace and Conflict Resolution graduate program at American University in Washington, D.C. You can also find Josh’s other published adventures here and here. Picture Reference: http://www.mycity-web.com/blogging-tips-editing-is-more-important-than-you-think/  Editor’s Note: Enjoy reading articles about your favorite hobby and engaging with fellow gamers? We do too, but hosting and producing our site isn’t free. Please consider visiting our Patreon page and supporting us at any amount. We put every dollar back into the site and its production, and your help has allowed us to have certain paid article months for our contributors. Thank you for your continued readership and your support!
-David Horwitz, Blog Manager In an article of his now-defunct blog, The DM Experience, (Which I hold up to this day as one of the greatest repositories of free Game Master knowledge for fantasy games. It was written during the days of 4th Edition, but 99% of the advice is system neutral) Wizards of the Coast’s Chris Perkins said that the number one tip he gives to DMs is, “Improvise.” It’s not a new concept, in fact it’s usually one of the first pieces of advice most Game Masters who know what they’re talking about will give you. There’s a very good reason for this. Naturally, being able to improvise will make it far easier to react to your players’ choices and increase their enjoyment with your campaign, but what they usually don’t mention is how much easier it can make your life. At least 50 - 60% of everything I do behind the screen is completely improvised. Sometimes my notes for a session are just a single sentence in a notebook, and if you watch our Actual Plays over on Caffeinated Conquests, you’ve seen me do it. However, while I like to flatter myself that over the years I’ve cultivated a fairly skillful approach to the craft, the honest truth is, it really isn’t difficult at all. Anyone can do what I do, and I’ll be happy to show you how. 1) It’s Not As Hard As You Think It Is The first step is to remove the mental blocks. Trying to improvise at the game table can be scary if you’re not used to it, a bit like a tightrope walker taking his first tentative steps without a net. The truth is, you can do this. Say it out loud, repeat it to yourself in the mirror if you need to. No matter how long you’ve been GMing, the skill is absolutely within your ability. The brutal truth is, you’re going to have to do it at some point whether you want to or not. Even if you run nothing but prewritten modules for your entire Game Mastering career, eventually your players will do something the module’s writers didn’t think of, and you’ll hear the bells tolling in the distance. It’s not difficult to do. I’m not a member of an improv troupe, I didn’t even take theatre in high school. I’m just some guy that has cultivated a skill, and you can too. 2) Release Your Scenarios Into The Wild The famous quote by American writer William Faulkner goes, “In writing you must kill all your darlings,” which means, in exceedingly simple terms, to cast aside our emotional attachments so we can do what is objectively best for the project. We’ve all been there. The players one-shot your Big Bad Evil Guy in an encounter they weren’t meant to fight him in, (free bit of advice, don’t ever introduce your players to a character unless you’re prepared for them to die a horrible death) or you design an entire dungeon and somehow the players circumvent the need to ever travel there in the first place. Once in a Pathfinder campaign, after the players had acquired a ship, I spent a week designing an entire nautical adventure that would occur on the way to their next destination, complete with washing up on a strange island of undead that not only advanced the plot but planted valuable foreshadowing for the future of the campaign. I showed up at the next session only to be respectfully showed on the official map of Golarion that the party’s next destination was connected by land. Here’s the trick: When stuff like that happens, let it. I like to think of the ideas I put into my campaigns as baby birds that I’m nurturing. When the idea has matured enough for the players to encounter it, I release that bird into the wild, and whatever happens, happens. It might soar majestically into the sunset, it might get picked off by the neighborhood cat, but it’s no longer up to me. This frame of mind makes it easier for me to accept two truths: Things might not go the way I intend, and that I need to be ready to adapt if they don’t. Sure, I try to steer things so they go the way I want, but I’m not dependant on it, and I don’t panic if I can’t. The real benefit to this mindset is that I’ve become vastly more comfortable with saying yes to my players when they come up with something I hadn’t anticipated, I’m not instantly thrust into a defensive posture trying to protect my perceived outcome of a situation. I’m not shocked if my players have an idea that can trivialize an encounter or bypass a puzzle, I’ve already accepted that as a possibility long before it was ever proposed. 3) Harness Player Agency If you let them, your players can take a great deal of the heavy lifting off your shoulders, as several sessions worth of play can result just from the players cleaning up a mess they themselves created. Wind ‘em up and let ‘em go, they’ll build your adventure for you. All you really need to do is provide an objective, a reason for the players to care about the objective, and a few complications that make achieving the objective interesting. (Bonus points for providing complications that can’t be simply resolved through combat. No matter how difficult you make the combat, it’s still an “easy” problem to solve) Whenever your players do something of some level of import, ask yourself one very simple question: “So what happens now?” Take a step back and look at the big picture. In your world, what is the most logical thing to result from what just happened? Let’s take the above example. Your players just killed the BBEG way before they were supposed to. So what happens now? Exceedingly few villains operate in a vacuum. Truly ingenious masterminds always have a plan B, and a villain who believes his actions are justified may even have one in the event of his demise. Everything from goblin hordes to Cthulhu cults and demonic legions have hierarchies, and where there are hierarchies, there are underlings gunning for their boss’ job. They’re not exactly going to weep inconsolably because some adventurers happened to expedite their promotion. Conspirators have co-conspirators, who probably aren't willing to dump several months of scheming down the pot, or better yet may suddenly need to cover their tracks. Again, think outside the box of combat. A duplicitous noble who sends assassins after the PCs will buy you 20 minutes of game time while the party beats the snot out of them and interrogates one for their employer. However, a noble who uses one of the ranger’s arrows to frame the PC’s for the murder of another political rival, thus making them appear as crazed murderers while keeping herself in the shadows will buy you an entirely new adventure. Even the lone sorcerer might have demonic pacts unfulfilled or latent magics waiting to trigger, and if you think a necromancer doesn’t have a back up plan for death… Let’s say you’re playing D&D and the party is on a quest for the magic sword Aelthrys, Talon of the Ancient Kings. You’ve spent weeks designing an epic multi-level dungeon filled with clever puzzles and fiendish traps at the bottom of which lays their prize. Wouldn’t you know it, the wizard just got a scroll of Wish from a random treasure table and used it to Wish for the McGuffin. (I’ve seen this happen more times than you might think) So what happens now? Well now there’s something very valuable, powerful and rare that’s much easier to get than it was before. Gee whiz, if only the PCs lived in a violent fantasy world overflowing with unscrupulous sentience. Maybe Garm the Brigand King knows the power foretold to the bearer of Aelthrys and isn’t opposed to slitting a few throats to get it. Maybe the local orc chieftain knows well the stories his ancestors told him of Throm’gar the Orc Hewer and he wishes to capture it as a trophy to unite the other orc clans beneath his banner. Either of them could have spies in the next town the PCs visit. There’s also the question of why the sword was so heavily guarded in the first place. Maybe it was the lynchpin of the prison of some ancient evil. Maybe the sword’s creator, an angelic commander of celestial legions feels the evil stir once more and intends to hold the party accountable. Maybe you’ve suddenly got a campaign for the next few months. (You can always reuse the dungeon somewhere else) 4) Keep Some Randomizers Handy Pulling a game out of thin air can be next to impossible with nothing to go on. The human brain can do some amazing things, but sometimes it needs a jumpstart. That’s why I like to keep something handy to give my creativity a jumping off point when necessary. Pathfinder has a great set of random tables in the Game Mastery Guide. When I was running my campaign I would, on occasion, deliberately not prepare anything that week and challenge myself to come up with an adventure from the tables on the spot. It was quite a lot of fun, actually. The D&D 5e Dungeon Master’s Guide has a metric ton of random tables in it, but in my opinion too many random pieces can muddle the mixture and turn what’s supposed to be a jumping off point into an obtuse pile of disparate pieces that needs to be clumsily hammered together. My advice would be to choose about three or so. My personal favorites are Dungeon/Wilderness Goals, Adventure Villains, and Twists from Chapter 3. Employ the Random Dungeon Generator as needed. What about games that don’t have random tables? You could create your own, but there’s an easier way. There’s a competition called Iron GM that holds their World Championships at GenCon every year. No, I haven’t won yet, but they haven’t seen the last of me. The competition provides contestants with a Creature, an Object, and a Place, and gives them one hour to create an adventure that prominently features those three elements. Just pick one of each and let your imagination go from there. This works for any game. Toreador, Book of Nod fragment, Nosferatu warrens. (Vampire the Masquerade) Nexus Crawler, Klaive, high rise apartment. (Werewolf the Apocalypse) Great Race of Yith, manhole cover, police department. (Call of Cthulhu) If necessary, ask your players to provide the elements. Here’s the catch, whatever the dice or the three elements suggest, stick with it. Challenge yourself. The less the individual pieces seem to fit together on the surface, the better. It’s an opportunity to flex your creative muscle and figure out how they can fit together. You’ll find yourself running adventures you would’ve never thought of otherwise, and your skills in improvisation and Game Mastering in general will grow before your eyes. 5) Don’t Be Afraid To Borrow From Your Future Self This is less of an issue with adventures that are only meant to last a session, but if you show up to a session expecting to piggyback off the events of the last session, (as I do frequently) then the greatest danger you face is that the players may end up lacking a goal that carries them to the end of the session, either by them accomplishing their mission sooner than you anticipated, or just the path to the goal becoming muddled somehow. The best thing to do in this scenario is to borrow from your future self. You have at least some ideas of where the future of your campaign will go, right? Drop some foreshadowing for the next arc of the campaign. Pull the trigger on the machinations of a future villain. Just give them something to do until the end of the session. You have until the next session to reconcile everything and put it back in order. If your players start putzing around with nothing to do and no clear objective, no matter how good the first part of the session was, it will diminish everyone’s enjoyment of the game, including your own. 6) Building Encounters Alright, that’s all well and good, but right now my Pathfinder and D&D players are saying, “That’s great Chaz, but what about combat encounters? How am I supposed to build balanced combat encounters on the fly? I can’t reference all those charts and do all that math that quickly!” I know because I used to be you. My advice is going to sound like heresy at first, but if what I’ve had to say has made sense up to now, you owe it to yourself to hear me out. Ditch the encounter building rules. Firstly, you may not realise this if your main avenue of the roleplaying hobby is some form of D&Derivative, but encounter rules are actually a fairly rare occurrence in RPGs. Vampire isn’t going to tell you how many frenzied Sabbat are a good match for the player coterie, Numenera won’t tell you what Tier the players need to fight an Erynth Grask, etc. Secondly, D&D itself didn’t even have these rules for decades. It wasn’t until after the Wizards of the Coast acquisition and Third Edition that encounter building became a part of the Core Rules. The absolutely earliest instance of it that I know of was in the 1991 D&D Rules Cyclopedia, and there it was clearly demarcated as an Optional Rule. No matter how you slice it, that’s still a full 17 years in which DM’s were happily pitting goblins against their players without a problem. Thirdly, characters in modern roleplaying games are significantly more resilient than the rules might suggest, exponentially so as they gain levels. A “balanced” encounter in most games is designed to drain the PCs of about ⅕ of their resources in exchange for experience points. That’s not high adventure, that’s grinding. Lastly, the rules don’t (because they can’t) account for the vagaries of the dice. I recently ran the Dungeon Crawl Classics adventure Sailors on the Starless Sea for two seperate groups of completely different people. There’s an encounter with seven beastmen about halfway into the adventure. The first group completely steamrolled the beastmen without them being able to land more than one or two scratches on the player characters. The second group, having one more person than the previous, very nearly TPK’ed (as in one player left with one hit point remaining) because my dice chose to rain apocalyptic fire upon the table that night. For that matter, encounter rules also can’t account for tactics, terrain, or any other extenuating circumstances. Encounter rules aren’t the perfectly calibrated mathematical formulae they might at first appear to be. They are suggestions, guidelines for new DM’s who aren’t yet comfortable enough to evaluate a monster’s abilities on their own. There’s a much easier, faster way to handle this. Just look at the numbers. Compare a creature’s AC, Attack Bonus, Hit Point and Saves to the party’s. In a fair fight, a monster should be able to land attacks on the moderately armored members of the party about 50% of the time, (hitting with an 11+ on the d20 after adding in their attack bonus) and vice versa for the party. Same for saves. You can translate this up or down a few points to increase/decrease the difficulty. Don’t expect all of the numbers to line up perfectly, monsters are designed to excel in certain areas and lag behind in others. Now, look at HP. Assume half the attacks will hit and the damage dice will roll half its maximum, (a balanced die’s average roll is usually half, of course most will roll higher or lower but they’ll usually balance each other out) you now have a decent idea of how long it will take one side to win the fight. As long as the PC’s have a reasonable chance of doing that to their enemies before their enemies do it to them, you’re golden. Some readers may be frustrated that this method lacks precision, but as I explained earlier, not even the official methods can technically give you precision. However, my method can be done at a glance without having to spend precious time dinking with math and numbers. Did you get into this hobby to tell fantastical stories or practice accounting? (Also, let’s be honest, the encounter building rules in the 5e Dungeon Master’s Guide is one of the most abysmal systems ever put to paper) Improvisation is not a skill we cultivate just for our players. It’s a huge quality of life improvement for us. When properly utilised, it can remove the laborious parts of our hobby and let us focus on the parts we really enjoy. It can help to mitigate GM burnout. It can help to make the games we run games for us as well, instead of a second job. Not to mention, your players can never derail your campaign, they can only change the plan. Chaz Lebel is a fiction author and member of Caffeinated Conquests, a YouTube channel dedicated to nerd comedy and tabletop gaming. He and his team once produced some promotional videos for High Level Games that they probably wish they could forget. Chaz can be found on Twitter @CafConIsOn Picture Reference: http://uptv.com/shows/whose-line-is-it-anyway/  Editor’s Note: If you like what you read here and want to help support our efforts to create a strong, inclusive community of gamers, please consider supporting us on Patreon. Every dollar helps!
This last month, I wrapped up a year and a half long Pathfinder campaign on our Twitch channel. Throughout the experience, which is comprised of over 120 hours of footage, I have learned a lot about streaming a roleplaying game on Twitch. My hope today is to pass on a chunk of these discoveries to you. Streaming tabletop games on Twitch is incredibly popular, especially for the basics like Dungeons and Dragons, but there is current noticeable growth for all roleplaying games on the platform. It can be daunting, so here are 5 tips for streaming roleplaying games on Twitch, just to make it a little bit easier as you’re starting out. 1) Camera Placement Is Important If you stream your games with your friends over Skype, the camera placement is already decided for you. Having an entire group together in one room offers a more engaging experience, but provides a challenge for the camera setup. We went through multiple setups until we decided on our final camera placement for our roleplaying sessions. When a potential viewer enters your channel they’ll want to be engaged immediately and your cameras will be responsible for that. First and foremost, you never want to place your camera somewhere else in the room and point it towards the table. Seeing a group of people sitting around a table with half of their back towards you is easily the least welcoming image someone can find when they enter your channel. The downside of streaming roleplaying games is that usually the groups for these games are pretty big; so if you’re playing in the same room, you’ll need multiple cameras. The best placement for a camera is directly pointing at one or two of your players. The audience will want to see your reactions, and a camera pointed face on is the best way to achieve that. We have all of our cameras in the centre of the table and facing directly towards our faces. This setup will come with a bit of upkeep, as you’ll need some sort of rig to hold your cameras in the centre table. We use extendable tripod arms that can be attached to the edge of the table, which can be found on Amazon for cheap. 2) Good Audio Is Vital The next step after setting up cameras is obtaining the audio equipment. Once again: if your streaming session is over Skype this issue is mostly solved for you, but the consistent quality will suffer as everyone’s microphone is different. If you’re streaming with everyone in the same room you’ll have more control over the microphones, but good audio equipment isn’t cheap. In a perfect world, each player will have their own microphone, but if this isn’t realistic for the budget you have set before you, there are other options. A single Snowball microphone set in the centre of the table will do a surprisingly good job in ensuring that everyone is heard at reasonable volumes. Another recommendation I have for audio equipment is to only upgrade if you feel that streaming these games will be consistent and worth it for you. If you’re only going to be streaming once or twice a month, it may not be the best use of money to upgrade everything immediately. Streaming on Twitch can be a slow burn and an audience won’t just appear overnight. Have your budget reflect that. 3) Decide On Your Level Of Audience Interaction The largest part of streaming on Twitch is the audience that visits your channel. The best way to hook them is interact with them. While roleplaying, it’s a challenge to constantly break away from the game to talk with people as they enter, so deciding on your interaction method before your stream is crucial. If you have a player or trusted colleague in chat as a moderator, they can respond to people as they enter, potentially engaging the audience member enough so they stick around. Furthermore you could take planned breaks in your game to specifically talk with people who may have entered and remained in chat. Another form of interaction is allowing chat members to directly impact the game. Obviously, this is something you’ll want to run by the GM to determine what level of chaos the chatters can put on a session. A simple solution is to allow viewers to choose a character to get a critical pass or fail. If the game you’re playing has items you can allow chat members to make their own magic item. Finally, a simple solution that works for the majority of games is allow a chat member to name or create an NPC. If you want to control the amount of impact a viewer can actually have on your game you can put these interaction levels behind a paywall. When you first start on Twitch you’ll only have access to direct PayPal donations, but if you stream consistently, you can become an Affiliate to Twitch and you’ll gain the Bits feature which is perfect for these kinds of interactions. 4) Build An Interesting Level Of Atmosphere A further way to keep your audience engaged is by adding music or sounds for atmosphere. If you’re not planning on uploading your content to YouTube, you can play any kind of music you want in the background. Copyrighted music will be muted in all Twitch VODs, so be aware of that if you wanted to use Twitch as a place to store your streams after they’re finished. There are plenty of royalty free music options out there on the internet. Tabletop Audio is a perfect place to go for atmospheric music that won’t be too demanding on your sound levels. If you want to get really creative you can find websites that let you build your own soundboards to add specific sound effects when needed. People in the audience may react well if you explain what the characters hear and suddenly they hear it too. Of course, all of this leads back to tip #2: balance your levels accordingly and have your players be the priority. Having your players dress up and bring props to the table could also lead to some interest from viewers. Someone who just popped into your channel may be more inclined to stay if they see one of the players dressed as a cranky old wizard. 5) There Is A Long Road Ahead Of You This one is quick and simple: something will go wrong. Streaming on Twitch is technologically overwhelming. There are various aspects you’ll need to be watching: bitrate, audio levels, camera, chat, donations, and not to mention the game you’re playing with your friends. It will be overwhelming and exhausting, but it will get easier the more you do it. As also mentioned earlier, it takes a lot of time to grow on Twitch. Don’t be discouraged if the audience doesn’t appear on your first stream. Our first month of streaming we didn’t hit more than 3 viewers at a time. Consistency in schedule and a commitment to growing quality will cause more viewers to become regulars. The entire struggle is worth it. I’ve built relationships with our long term viewers and the support they offer is indescribable. Starting is the hardest part of streaming. I’ve seen a lot of people on the internet say that if they were going to stream, they would want everything perfect before they started. That’s impossible. When we started we tied a GoPro to a ceiling fan to hang it over the table. We quickly learned that this wasn’t the best method, but just because our first stream wasn’t “perfect” doesn’t mean we were immediately shunned from the streaming community. In the end, you’re doing all of this because you love playing these games and you want to show the world the fun you’re having so they can take part. Don’t let the daunting, and often thankless, start turn you away from the world of streaming roleplaying games. Hopefully this helps you get started on Twitch. There’s so much more to talk about in each area, of which we’ve only skimmed the surface. I’d love to talk more and offer assistance to anyone looking to start playing tabletop games on the internet. You can find me on Twitter here. There’s also the High Level Games’ Facebook page where a whole plethora of awesome people will be able to help you with any sort of roleplaying problem you may have. Do you have any pieces of advice for streamers? Share it in the comments below! Justin Cauti is a writer and Twitch streamer. He plays board/roleplaying games on the internet at http://www.playingboardgames.tv. Follow him on Twitter for updates on his boring life and writing projects @LeftSideJustin. Picture Reference: https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/16/16666344/dungeons-and-dragons-twitch-roleplay-rpgs-critical-role-streaming-gaming  “The punishment should fit the crime” is a good general rule, but there’s plenty of room for exceptions. One of the worst curses in Ravenloft canon is the mishamel, which has nothing to do with a specific crime, but exists as a general deterrent against offending the Vistani. Likewise, stealing from Ankhtepot’s tomb causes a character to age a year every day, but there’s no clear reflection of the crime in that punishment, either. Even matching the severity of the crime only applies to the most traditional curses of vengeance; as explained in my earlier article, it’s possible to receive a powerful curse for a small offense, or even for a good deed, under the right circumstances. With that in mind, here are some plug-and-play curse ideas that are just looking for the right opportunity.
1) Adventure Magnet “Live you always among monsters, and see everyone you love die beneath their claws!” With those words Madame Radanavich unwittingly set Rudolph Van Richten on the road from humble herbalist to a legendary scholar of the occult. I thought of this when one of my players came up with a great character concept that was just too practical for an adventuring career. On the first adventure, the PC turned down a desperate woman’s plea, and was cursed that “Those without help will always find you, until you cannot stop your ears to their cries!” The character who was too practical to pursue adventuring found adventure hooks just landed on the doorstep, refusing to be ignored. 2) Marked For Death The Final Destination film series portrays a struggle against rabid coincidence that makes for a good Lethal curse. There are many ways to reflect it in the rules: all attacks against the character might be treated as critical threats (i.e. automatic hit, roll for crit) or do max damage. Traps or spells that should randomly select a target always select the PC, and they don’t ever get a save against area effects. To truly create a sense of faceless danger like the films, have the PC save once a day to avoid a freak accident. This is a good substitute for lycanthropy in some break-the-curse adventures, as some players might see lycanthropy as a bonus. 3) Shadow Boxing While the Vistani see curses as serious business, other creatures such as Midnight Cats might be much more inclined to play around. An animated shadow is often just the ticket for comic relief, as would be a harmless silhouette on the wall or floor pantomiming commentary on the PC’s words and actions. This can be customized for specific situations, such as a shadow that depicts the truth when the target lies, or taunts people the target respects. Such a curse might never rise above the Frustrating level of severity, but it gives lots of opportunity for roleplay and can even entertain the players as it frustrates their plans. 4) Unnatural Aura The Scent of the Grave feat offered in Van Richten's Arsenal is often an example of being blessed with suck (Warning, TV Tropes link). If your PCs can find a bonus in normal animals being frightened or aggressive in their presence, then more power to them, but most people would consider that a curse. For every situation where they avoid being tracked by bloodhounds, there are many more where horses spook and bolt, wolves attack, dogs cause a ruckus or cats yowl and hiss until the locals start whispering about witchcraft. It works far better as a curse than taking up a feat slot, but if you think your PC is getting too much mileage out of it, add the additional effect that food spoils quickly in their presence, such that they can’t save any for longer than a day. So if your PCs are on the fast track for some mojo but you don't know the specific whammy you want to put on them, consider a generic version. Punishments don't always have to have that perfect fit, as long as they are punishments. After all, it's really what people do about it that makes them unique. Leyshon Campbell has been playing and writing for Ravenloft for over twenty years, from the Kargatane's Book of S series, playtesting D&D 3E in a Ravenloft campaign, to the ill-fated Masque of the Jade Horror. He married his wife on Friday the 13th after proposing to her on Halloween. By tradition, the first story read at birth to each of their three children was The Barker’s Tour, from Ravenloft’s “Carnival” supplement. Picture Reference: http://dndspeak.com/2017/12/100-curses/  The hobby of tabletop RPGs can be an expensive one; between multiple hardcovers, miniatures, and gaming aids, it can all add up quickly. Fortunately, there are plenty of fantastic, free RPGs available for download. Beware, for it can be difficult to determine which ones are worth looking into.
The process of finding a good RPG becomes even more difficult if you’re wanting to delve into the realm of fantasy, as there are many heartbreakers in a saturated market. If you’re like me, you enjoy trying new fantasy themed games, and occasionally want a break from the world’s most popular roleplaying game. Below is a list of five of my personal favorite fantasy RPGs that you can download and play free of charge. 1) Dungeon Slayers This little gem is rules-lite, with each character having a core set of three attributes and six traits. These statistics ultimately determine the combat values of the characters. This simple formula results in quick character creation so you can get to slaying those dungeons. The game has been released into the creative commons, is in its fourth edition, and has plenty of fan material. The core rulebook is only ten pages long, making the other 162 pages of content icing on the cake. 2) Talislanta This game has been around for a long time and has seen a total of five different editions. The world itself is strictly in the realm of fantasy and offers a slew of interesting races that aren’t your typical elves and dwarves. The world of Talislanta is vast, and each culture is established, though there's plenty of room for tinkering. Its broad nature makes it perfect for sandbox style games. Even if you’re not a fan of the system itself, this is a free mine of ideas worth digging into. 3) Basic Fantasy There are many retro-clones on the market, a ton of which can be obtained for free, yet few of them have as much support from the community as Basic Fantasy. This fantastic game is often compared to the old basic and expert D&D books with a few modern changes, such as ascending Armor Class. Even though the core book is all you need to play, there are many adventure modules, an extra bestiary, and expanded classes to be had. The PDF is free of course, but If you enjoy hard copies of your RPGs, Basic Fantasy is sold on Amazon for cheap. 4) Heroes Against Darkness One word springs to mind when I think of this game: flexible. Heroes Against Darkness is a wonderful d20 fantasy system with eleven classes and eight races to choose from. The game offers a nice break from the typical Vancian magic found in many D20 games. The point based magic system makes casters spend Anima Points to cast spells. Players will find a plethora of options here, and GMs will be thrilled with the step-by-step method of monster creation. Not only is this system free, but it is under creative commons and may be freely distributed as long as you don’t alter the work or claim it as your own. 5) Mazes and Minotaurs Like old school game mechanics and Greek mythology? Then I have just the game for you! The revised edition of Mazes and Minotaurs was released in 1987 and features three core books: The Player’s Manual, Maze Master’s Guide, and Creature Compendium. The game feels and plays much like a classic OSR game but oozes Greek mythos. Classes include Amazons, Barbarians, Centaurs, Nymphs, and many more. There are also several other books that support the system, and all of them are free as well. Whatever your game of choice may be, it can be nice to have a change of pace from time to time. With the impressive amount of generous creators in our hobby, you’re never too far away from a great game, at a fantastic price. Nathan Carmen is the founder and head writer of the Indie RPG company Tricky Troll Games. Nathan loves building worlds and improving his craft when he’s not busy parenting. Reach Nathan at [email protected] or check out the TTG website at https://nathanccarmen.wixsite.com/trickytrollgames Picture Reference: http://mazesandminotaurs.free.fr/revised.html  Here at HLG, our Corporate Overlords actually ARE benevolent and have sunk countless hours and their own actual money into the upkeep up the site and taking care of us lowly content producers (you know, the ones whose work you enjoy reading and listening too). Help them help us entertain you, and support our Patreon here.
If you’ve been playing roleplaying games beyond D&D for any length of time, you’ve probably heard of Pelgrane Press. From 13th Age to a wide array of GUMSHOE products featuring the Cthulhu Mythos, vampires fighting super spies, and time-traveling hijinks, Pelgrane has been a force to be reckoned with. Managing Director Cat Tobin was gracious enough to answer a few questions about Pelgrane Press’ fantastic 2017, and what’s shaping up to be an even better 2018. The past year has been great for Pelgrane Press, with the release of the Bestiary 2 and completion of the Battle Scenes series for 13th Age, Cthulhu Confidential, #Feminism, and a very successful Kickstarter campaign for The Yellow King. What big projects are you excited about for this year? 2017 was a record year for us, and I think 2018 is going to be even bigger for Pelgrane. The reason for that are the two projects I’m most excited about. The first is Fall of Delta Green. This is Kenneth Hite’s 1960s setting, which adapts Arc Dream’s intense thriller Delta Green: The Role-Playing Game for the GUMSHOE system. The 1960s brought us the moon landing, war in Vietnam, and counterculture in Haight-Ashbury, and so this decade offers a wealth of roleplaying opportunities to investigate through the twisted lens of the Delta Green mythos. I knew this was a great match of setting and system when I playtested the game, but it wasn’t until I saw the amazing art and design that Jen McCleary brought to the interior layout that I realised it was going to be one of the best books we’ve ever published on all metrics. I can’t wait for this to be released. The other project I’m excited about is the delivery of Robin D. Laws’ The Yellow King RPG. This is a four-book core set, featuring the main rules – a streamlined version of GUMSHOE that we’re calling the Quick Shock system – in with the earliest setting, the Belle Epoque Paris featured in Robert W. Chambers’ original short stories. As a four-book set in a slipcase, it’s the most significant core book we’ve done, and Robin’s chosen top artists to illustrate it - Aaron Acevedo, Melissa Gay, Rachel Kahn, and Jessica Lee - so the art is stellar. Robin’s nearly finished the writing now, and most of the art is done, so we’re currently on track to have this to Kickstarter backers before December. Dean Engelhardt, who you might remember designed The Hawkins Papers for the Dracula Dossier for us, has now finished Absinthe in Carcosa, an in-world supplement for The Yellow King RPG. I think it’s no exaggeration to say that Dean’s an industry leader at producing realistic aged documents, and he doesn’t disappoint in Absinthe. Outside of Night’s Black Agents: SOLO, will GUMSHOE One-2-One be expanding to any other properties? Cthulhu Confidential really scratched an itch for a lot of people who were looking for games to introduce partners to roleplaying, and its two-person format makes it really easy to run games online, too, so it has a lot of potential. The solo protagonist is a classic of both genre and non-genre media, and so the problem we have is too much choice of which setting to adapt next! I really like Agatha Christie’s work, and I’d love to do something like a Miss Marple or Hercule Poirot One-2-One setting. I’m very keen to do a non-genre One-2-One book, so that’s likely up next after Night’s Black Agents: SOLO. Our writers have pitched at least half a dozen other projects for One-2-One, so there’s definitely more settings coming! First with Seven Wonders in 2016, and more recently with #Feminism in 2017, it seems like Pelgrane is moving more into micro game anthologies. Do you have plans for any this year, and what themes would you like to explore in future anthologies? That’s a great question. We don’t plan it, but every now and again, one of us come across a game in the experimental/micro-game space that really grabs our interest; for me, Becky Annison’s When the Dark is Gone inspired the Seven Wonders anthology, and when I heard that #Feminism, which I wrote a nano-game for, was looking for a new publishing home, I jumped on it immediately – that’s a project that really resonates with our company goals. Recently, Simon’s played Steve Dempsey’s Da’Zoon, which is a GUMSHOE-lite system which distributes some elements of world creation to the players, and he really likes it, so that might end up on the publishing schedule as part of an anthology or setting collection. Simon and I have both playtested Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan’s drone, which is a futuristic short game, where three players play controllers of a reanimated drone, played by the fourth player. It’s got a solid core, and we’re likely to end up publishing that in some format, too, although likely not as an anthology. In terms of actual plans, we’re seriously considering two anthologies featuring our systems; the first, a new anthology of DramaSystem Series Pitches, and the second, an anthology of short GUMSHOE games. These are both longer-term projects, and likely to be next year or the year after, though. One of the big successes for you last year was The Yellow King. What one big tip can you give to others who may be looking to fund their own projects through Kickstarter? A thing I always say about Kickstarters is that you have to bring your own audience. Unfunded Kickstarters are often the result of creators who’ve set up a campaign and then sat back, expecting an audience to show up. That’s not how it works! You have to establish a fanbase, and get them really excited about your project, before you Kickstart it. Then once you’re up and running, tell everyone about it. Talk about it on your social media channels. Share previews with reviewers and popular online hangouts for your target market. Which brings me to another point – make it look good. Your video and sample art are the things most likely to get your campaign shared, so make them as professional and slick as you possibly can. What conventions will Pelgrane Press be making appearances at this year? Can we expect to see any Pelgranistas at HLGCon in October? We always have a booth at three conventions: Origins Game Fair in Columbus, Ohio; Gen Con in Indianapolis, Indiana, and Dragonmeet in London, UK. Last year, we also had a booth at PAX Unplugged in Philadelphia, and we’re likely to be back there again this year. I love going to conventions, and I always try to get to one of the Double Exposure conventions in Morristown, New Jersey. So you never know – I might stop by HLGCon on the way! Check out Pelgrane Press’ website here, and their DriveThruRPG products here. Phil Pepin is a history-reading, science-loving, head-banging, river-running nerd, who would like nothing more than to cuddle with his pups and wife. Picture Reference: http://site.pelgranepress.com/index.php/about-us/  Editor’s Note: If you like what you read here and want to help support our efforts to create a strong, inclusive community of gamers, please consider supporting us on Patreon. Every dollar helps!
For the month of April, High Level Games has decided to give a test for another themed month: The Creature Feature! This month is dedicated to monsters and minions of all kinds in this beloved hobby of ours. Though with a name like that, and 2018 being the 200th anniversary of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein being published, I felt there was an opportunity we’re missing. So with that said, I’ve decided to take this time to bring some attention to my favorite line in the World of Darkness; that game about our modern world, fraught with all manner of otherworldly creatures, some of which you get to play as! Let me tell you about Promethean: The Created! (Note: This article was written in regards to the 1st Edition of Promethean published by White Wolf in 2006. As a result, some details may be different than what is reflected by its 2nd Edition.) 1) The Premise Promethean is a game about humanity. It’s about what it means to be human and what it takes to create a human. It plays with the idea that there’s something more than just the physical makeup of our bodies that make us human, something more than just the psychological paradigms we possess and develop. It takes that assumption that there’s something else needed, and puts the player in the position of being something that certainly could be a human. Something that technically has the quantifiable parts (Water 35L, carbon 20kg, ammonia 4L…) but might not have been put together right. They’re not complete, and because of this, the whole of reality rejects them. People and animals are driven into a frenzy when they spend too much time around them, and even the very landscape withers at their presence. A promethean’s facsimile of life is one fraught with torment, but they’re one of the few creatures in the World of Darkness who can have a comparatively happy ending. 2) The Lineages Prometheans can be classified based on how they were created, known as their Lineage. These Lineages are inspired by various real world myths regarding irregular creations of human life, such as the Tammuz, Golems of Hebrew lore, or the Frankensteins, borrowing from Mary Shelley’s novel of the same name, as well as myths of rebirth such as the ancient Egyptian tale of Osiris. Being supernatural creatures, prometheans have some fantastic powers, some of which are determined by their lineage, such as a Frankenstein having immense physical strength, or how Golems never seem to grow tired. Lineage also determines the shape of the various trials and tribulations a promethean will inevitably face on their journey to become human. 3) The Horrors This wouldn’t be a World of Darkness game if there wasn’t some horrific downsides to the creature you were playing as. Prometheans arguably have it the worst; the bulk of their problems can be summed up as “they shouldn’t exist, and reality as a whole rejects them.” The first such effect is Wasteland. The very environment around a promethean begins to decay around them if they hang around too long, usually within a matter of days. The results differ depending on what the promethean’s lineage is, since each lineage is associated with one of the four classical elements (and spirit.) Tammuz are ruled by Earth, so as a result of their Wasteland effect, the land around them becomes blighted and unsuitable for vegetation. Plants wither and die, the ground itself becomes difficult to till, and buildings appear to be crumbling and ready to collapse at any moment. Compounding this is the phenomenon of Disquiet, which affects the minds of the communities that the promethean interacts with, spreading derangement like a disease. It always starts small, affecting only a few people they interact with at a time. To the chagrin of prometheans, the more time they spend around these few people, the more likely those people will spread that mental illness with each other. Much like Wasteland, the specific effects vary by lineage; Frankenstein’s will sow paranoia, pettiness, and desires for revenge among the populace they find themselves in. Once friendly neighbors become jealous of one another, constantly aiming to sabotage each other. Trust and cooperation become things of the past, at least until the mass revelation that everything was fine until THAT PERSON showed up. This revelation predictably ends with an unruly mob convinced that the Frankenstein is the cause of their civil unrest, armed with the proverbial pitchforks and torches. 4) The Refinements As all supernatural creatures in the world of Darkness are wont to do, ideologies form about the nature of their condition. For prometheans, whose end goal is to become human, such ideologies are part and parcel to their journey. These are known as Refinements, and they answer the question: “What is it that would make us human?” Each of the refinements has a different answer. Aurum, the Refinement of Gold, believes that the best way to become human would be to blend in with humanity and to attempt to copy them. Meanwhile, Curprum, the Refinement of Copper, asserts that the answer lies not within human society, but rather the seclusion of being a promethean. Since change is a recurring theme throughout Promethean: The Created, the core rulebook describes that many prometheans eventually find that there isn’t any one particular answer to what would make a promethean human. With that said, it isn’t uncommon for prometheans to change their refinement throughout their life. A promethean that encounters other supernatural creatures that were once human might adopt Argentum (Silver), a Refinement revolving around living with and studying supernatural creatures who were once human. Or a promethean that spends more time amongst their fellow created might adopt the philosophies of Aes (Bronze), which pertains to prometheans forming their own societies (but does not require having been in the Copper or Tin refinements first.). 5) The Subtext Horror is often described as being a medium with more meaning than what is initially presented, with even Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein having numerous interpretations, some which still ring true today. With this in mind, interpreting literature or other works of fiction is a very subjective matter, and one interpretation doesn’t necessarily invalidate another. What we have in Promethean is a bunch of people who certainly should be like anybody else, but something is off. Despite how swiftly prometheans learn, they never quite get what being a human is like; even if they can describe it in perfect detail, their execution is always just a little bit off. Additionally, when things go wrong they tend to overreact, and even if things don’t go wrong, a promethean inevitably winds up being rejected by the communities they find themselves in. Which is a shame, since the ultimate goal of a promethean is to be a part of and accepted by the human world. These are challenges that are similar to those faced by people on the autism spectrum; a place I find myself, complete with the same harrowing experiences. It’s rather upsetting to watch one of your peers be praised for something you were moments earlier just punished for. Or when fighting back against other demonstrably unfair treatments, being met with dismissive attitudes such as “it’s not that big of a deal” or “don’t be weird and this wouldn’t happen.” Even with just this basic understanding of Promethean, there’s still plenty for you to work with if you’re the sort that enjoys making your own monsters for horror games that your player characters can brave mowing down. Assuming you can ignore the allegory that these socially disruptive monsters are people with autism, that is. ...but if you can’t, is it really horror if it doesn’t make you uncomfortable? Aaron der Schaedel is on the autism spectrum, and this may or may not be related to why he refuses to use his real name on the internet. Or why he’s always changing his biography blurb. If you want to shame him for giving this article such a downer ending, you can find him on twitter @Zamubei. Picture Reference: http://theonyxpath.com/category/worlds/chroniclesofdarkness/prometheanthecreated/  Seven years ago, I participated in a 24-hour roleplaying game session which was going to change everything in my life. We created our own world, as was the yearly tradition in that group, and I was asked to help. Within a couple of weeks, I’d provided two alien races and worked with the small group of other Game Masters to create a Sci-Fi campaign which would entertain fifty players for six sessions held during 24 hours.
That was the last roleplaying game I had the chance to play for several years, but when I had another opportunity, I chose to resurrect that universe, tweak it, and run stories within it. Over the next two years, that became Era: The Consortium the first game that I created. During the creation of that game, however, I met an individual who inspired me, helped me understand that we could do more. He applied as a writer and had been working on superhero comics for major names in the industry for 15 years. Our first convention working together, we spent much of the off-time discussing the potential applications for superheroes under the rules, and designing a superhero universe. That game became Era: The Empowered, a game which is currently on Kickstarter. It was funded within 18 hours, and has now broken three Stretch Goals. Here are the reasons I think you will find Era: The Empowered remarkable. 1) The Universe Era: The Empowered doesn’t give you just one type of scenario to play. It offers every sub-genre of superhero story you could want. You can be one of the first Empowered to appear, while the world knows nothing of abilities or how they work, and most refuse to even believe in them. You can play later, where you may train sidekicks or team up with others to face larger threats. You can save your city or even the world. You can face the Old Gods as they wake from millennia of slumber and claim rulership over the entire planet. You can fight the Assassins’ Guild, who seek to eliminate all Empowered. You can stand in defence of our world when extraterrestrial threats arrive, looking to invade, conquer, or consume. The 300-page rulebook contains 155 pages of setting information which allow you to leap into whichever time period suits the story you’re looking for in this extensive and detailed history. The way the universe is presented has also been well-received: the events which form the universe are presented in a timeline, which contains short stories to illustrate the events of history and provide them with emotional context. So, instead of just reading fictional historical “facts”, the reader is drawn into the moment and can enjoy a well-told story which explains what it was really like to face down the soldiers of Atlantis, even as an Empowered. Shades of Vengeance has recently finished a previous Kickstarter which offered the chance to make your own superhero a character in the universe. “Tales of the Empowered” was a great success, bringing many more heroes, from a variety of backgrounds and with some amazing powers, into the Empowered universe. This book is also included as a reward for anyone who wants it! 2) The Era d10 Rule Set The Era d10 Rule Set is a dice pool system where the number of dice you roll is based on Attribute + Skill and allows a variable Success Threshold based on chances of success. It’s an easy-to-learn system that’s been run by first-timers with great success, as well as giving veterans enough complexity to keep them interested. The addition of Kill Thresholds on damage rolls and opposed rolls to resolve grapples makes combat smooth and streamlined, giving a much more immersive experience than some other rule sets. You can check out the Era: The Consortium Quickstart for free here. Era: The Empowered takes this basis and applies a new mechanic relating to powers: the Power Tree. This allows you describe any power you like, no matter how incredibly strong it is, and keep it balanced. In order to access the most powerful abilities, a character must spend points in “Lockout Layers”, which ensures that low-level characters could have them… but only with a very limited level of skill. Limited uses are also encouraged within the system, where an ability is especially powerful. 3) An Ever-Expanding Multiverse All of the Era games are cross-compatible. There are people out there who have added elements of Era: Hitman, Era: The Consortium, and Era: Survival in order to play a Starfinder game, complete with magic. Shades of Vengeance has produced over 35 products in the last four years and has no plans to slow down. With Era: The Empowered, there’s a new and different way to handle superpowers within the Rule Set, and several more game releases planned for this year will also contribute to that. Era: The Consortium itself has ten expansions already published with two in production, and Era: Survival, our other full-length rulebook, also has three expansions. With that in mind, it seems likely that Era: The Empowered, which has endless possibilities for further rules and story, will also be given expansions. In fact, there’s one already visible in the Stretch Goals list, which will provide for Golden Age superheroes! 4) Awesome Extras Shades of Vengeance loves universes and loves to expand them. They offer additional material for them, and Era: The Empowered is no exception: two audio stories have already been released, with three more planned for publication during the campaign. You can find them all on the Kickstarter “Campaign” page under the title “What is Era: The Empowered?”. These audio stories were read by Leo Cosh and give a brief glimpse into the universe during the various events that we’ve described. Shades of Vengeance funds its games via Kickstarter, so the more support that the campaigns receive, the more books get made. If you check out the Kickstarter, don’t miss the official Era: The Empowered Facebook Group, where new content is added every day to provide more information and answer questions about the various facets of the game. Thank you very much for reading, and I hope to welcome you into the Empowered! Ed Jowett is the Managing Director of Shades of Vengeance and has been creating tabletop roleplaying games and card games for 5 years. He runs most of the playtests and the majority of the convention games which take place in the UK, as well as his own campaigns with his private group. He’s a dedicated gamer who loves to play with new people as well as veterans and works to create interesting and immersive universes. You can find more information about Shades of Vengeance at http://www.shadesofvengeance.com. Picture Reference: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/shadesofvengeance/era-the-empowered-a-super-powered-rpg?ref=7nj12a  Indie tabletop RPG publisher Melting Point Publishing has released their first ever Kickstarter. Unlike most Kickstarters, you can receive a copy of any book unlocked during the Kickstarter and its stretch goals.
Check it out here. The Kickstarter’s focus is The Krell Effect - a sci-fi adventure that sees the party thrown headfirst into a literal race against time as a megalomaniacal scientist targets them for death while he tries to unlock the secret to control the forces of time itself. Can your party solve the mysteries and thwart his scheme before the crazed scientist threatens all of existence with his hubris? They better - or all of time and space will be at risk! Their other upcoming stand alone adventures cover a range of styles, times, and themes; from action and adventure stories to mysterious tales of monsters and madmen. They range from traditional fantasy epic adventures, through to Victorian and WW2 era mysteries, and even more. Here's six reasons why you should back this exciting new Kickstarter! 1) Unlocks As It Progresses Anyone pledging at the £10 New Adventures Bundle level will receive a copy of all the books unlocked as stretch goals free of charge. That’s right, you'll receive a copy of everything that’s unlocked as the Kickstarter progresses! 2) Instant Adventure If you pledge at the New Adventures Bundle level you'll receive The Krell Effect (mentioned above) and a ready to use mini adventure (Carjacked) for Savage Worlds. If enough stretch goals are hit, you can choose to receive your rewards for either FATE or Savage Worlds. 3) Discounts The first 20 backers can buy the already released adventure, Still Life and Death, for a 50% discount. This allows you to pick up the first adventure released at a great discount so you can own the entire range of adventures. Still Life and Death sees the party hired to discover the whereabouts of a missing girl; from there they are drawn into a bizarre mystery involving multiple missing people and antique paintings that seem to depict them being attacked by a variety of monstrous creatures. The party is hurled into multiple encounters with supernatural monsters before coming face-to-face with the scheme’s mastermind. Can they thwart the mysterious figure’s plans, or will they become his final victims? 4) The Ground Floor You'll be helping a new publisher release a range of exciting new adventures! Furthermore, it’s an opportunity to interact with a fast growing company from the beginning. Melting Point Publishing is looking to help build a community of roleplayers; if you join their Kickstarter you can be part of this movement from the very start. 5) Faster Releases Helping Melting Point Publishing speed up their release schedule will allow them to publish full campaign books and settings in the near future. This means even more great adventures, campaigns, and settings available to you and your party. 6) Help Fellow Backers You'll be helping the other backers to unlock more rewards. The more rewards that are unlocked, the more rewards every backer of the New Adventures Bundle level will receive free of charge. This means it’s in the interest of the backers to help spread the word to the rest of the RPG community. Your assistance is appreciated! If you would like to check out some of Melting Point Publishing's work for free, then you can download their PC character pack for use with Still Life and Death here: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/227964/Still-Life-and-Death-Character-Pack Melting Point Publishing is an up and coming games developer and publisher, and they're looking for your help. So, if you're looking for a variety of interesting adventures for your tabletop roleplaying group then look no further. Ben Baker is the head writer at Melting Point Publishing. He’s been an avid roleplayer since childhood, and loves helping the RPG community make the most of the technological possibilities available to us in the 21st century. Check out their Kickstarter here: www.kickstarter.com/projects/1762405716/new-tabletop-rpg-adventures-from-melting-point-pub Find him on Twitter: www.twitter.com/MPP_Games Join their Facebook group: www.facebook.com/groups/389243758202302/ |
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