#rpggeek

[ludorg]

J’ai une collectionite aigüe :)

[prokopetz]

I was about to ask you for a TTRPG suggestion but realized it's not nearly specific enough. Which got me wondering: where IS a good place to look for TTRPG suggestions? Googling just leads to the usual suspects, and going to RPGGeek or itch and just clicking around is going to find you a lot of hasty hacks, gimmicks, and supplements all mixed together.

You might check out @theresattrpgforthat, for starters. Their whole blog is about curated tabletop RPG recs, and they're a fair sight less picky than me about what sorts of requests they take because they're open to questions of the "I'm idly curious whether tabletop RPGs with feature X exist" variety, whereas my rec posts are more about "I need a tabletop RPG for specific purpose X". (And yes, I can tell when the requesting party doesn't have a specific purpose in mind – it shows!)

[open-hearth-rpg]

#RPGCovers Week Fourteen Historica Arcanum (2022) Yağmur Kıyak

Nothing fills me with joy right now then a new cover, out of the blue, hitting me right between the eyes. That’s what happened when I saw a new collection from the Bundle of Holding. Historica Arcanum, it turns out is an amazing looking campaign setting from a Turkish Publisher, Metis Creative.

Empires of the Silk Road and Herald of Rain offer an alternate 13th Century Silk Road designed as an open world, and an adventure designed to build up to one climactic struggle in a legendary dungeon. The City of Crescent presents an alternate 19th-Century Istanbul. Those are complemented by map packs, wallpapers, tokens, and a soundtrack album. 

This is very much my jam– I loved historical sourcebooks, it covers two periods I dig, and I love Islamic history in general. It’s for D&D 5e which is not my jam, but seems easily ported over to other systems. I’d never heard of this before, but it apparently had a Kickstarter back in September 2022. It isn’t on DTRPG atm and isn’t listed in the RPGGeek Database. 

But the covers. Wow. Empires of the Silk Road sets the template. We have a dark black background with striking geometrical Islamic patterning around the outside. It’s like the finest woodcut. Then there’s the skull– the top of the head vanishing under the overlay of the title. The jewelry here is ornate, elaborate and, like the page border, nearly symmetrical  despite the complexity. It is such an amazing feat of draftsmanship. Then there’s the skull beneath the chains with whirlpool-like eye sockets. And then open mouth and the screaming fangs. I love that the skull image is the thing which breaks the symmetry. 

One thing that you might not take in the first time you look at it: the head-scarf, the sigils to the left and the pentagram to the right. 

The paired image to this is Herald of Rain, the campaign sourcebook for the setting. We have the same page border here, but done in dark red and difficult to see. But our skull face here is, in contrast, distinctly non-symmetrical, split unevenly. I love the fine detail on the metalwork of the mask. I can only assume it's a funerary one given that the eye slit doesn’t line up. Is it the mask of a Chinese lord or from some other stop on the Silk Road. Here the head scarf is replaced by flowing brown hair.

Finally, the more modern sourcebook, City of Crescent presents the border in a striking orange, but this time the border which boxes it in is thicker and more distinct. The orange here matches the tan of the uniform. The big signifier here is the fez atop the skull’s head– a sign of the 19th Century Ottoman attempts to mark themselves as modern and part of the supposedly advanced colonialist world. And, of course, there’s the characteristic mustache, out of place on a skull. I love the incongruity of that.   

But that mustache does draw attention to a detail which I find striking: they’re all the same skull. I don’t know if that means anything, but I love it.  

It also reminds me of the great series of covers done for the Brian Lumley Necroscope books from the 80s & 90s.

[sk3tchisworld]

Dreamscape Update!

The name is now SLEEPING WILLOW.

I was doing my due diligence and researching the original game name: Dreamscape. While the other game with the same name was released in 2004 (on rpggeek) I decided to play it safe. I changed it to Dreamcraft. This game was done in 2020. Too close to home. So now the current name I have chosen points to a major part of the setting and still has a dreamy feel to it.

NEXT

I have settled on three main mechanics: Blackjack, Five Card Poker, and Card Dueling.

Blackjack is the main mechanic to have a conversation with a Dreamer and to craft dreams.

Five Card Poker covers the ‘Town Social Play’ a mode in which you experience events throughout the town of Dreamscape.

Card Dueling is used against Nightmares. I’ve considered removing this mechanic . It’s one I’m making up and requires a lot of explanation to understand although the actual gameplay is simple and has some tension.

Removing Card Dueling means I may be able to ignore a different concept for ‘Nightmares Severity’ and ‘NPC Complexity’. I want to be as focused and streamlined as possible.

NEXT

I am working on the oracles. Hearts as Emotions, Diamonds as Materials, Clubs as Challenges, and Spades as Dangers are safe bets. Unfortunately, the last two things felt confusing to me. There is a gray area between danger and challenge depending on who you’re talking to. I also didn’t want to get too dark and lose the cozy feel. So…

Themes for Suits:

Heart - Time

Diamonds - Mystery

Clubs - Connections

Spades - Mystical (name pending)

And I have a theme for each kind of card Ace, Face Card, and Numbered. I want to keep the Jokers in, but that may have to come with a later update. That may be hard if I want to join the next months Jam!

LAST

My remaining tasks are at least:

Complete Oracle (Just a universal one for now)

Layout (it's just a mess of material right now)

Art & Design (Procreate Doodles and Game Icons)

Grammar/Spelling/Word Choice (So much will slip by)

Setting Description (Enough to set a mood and with literal room for expansion)

Brief Lore (To ground players and create a mindset)

Example Gameplay (Technically me playtesting)

Anyway! This is my game so far (without getting too in-depth). It's due in 9 days, but I’m trying to make it 8 and use 9 to fix anything if I find it last minute.

[axial-twist]

a thousand kisses for ttrpg designers who include detailed information about their game dimensions, format, number pages, etc on the itch/kickstarter page so i don't have to spend 5 years tracking it down when adding their game to rpggeek

[seaofstarsrpg]

Styles of Game Mastering, this is mine.

Styles of Game Mastering, this is mine.

Over at RPGGeek, there is a discussion about GMing styles (which you can find here) where I replied but I thought that I would share it here as well. So, my thoughts on how I run a game. My World, I have the final say about how things are, how they work and how it all fits together. That being said, I love for players to add, adapt and build off of things in the setting. Just because I have the…

[worstactionhero]

In a rare posting involving something I actually did instead of rebloggin something I have a mild to severe fetish for, I was inspired last week by a photograph from the Vietnam War to create something for a RPG I have not plaed in 35+ years and will most likely never play again.

Never the less I am flexxing derivitive creative pursuits of mild to sever talents for in creating a fan fic, a sketch/drawing/painting, and a possible game module for.

[onlyonesecrets]

Ei!!

Você aí!

Isso mesmo! Você aí revisando todas redes sociais ao mesmo tempo porque está sendo consumido pelo tédio. Deixa eu te fazer um proposta, Que tal entrar em um mundo inteiramente mágico, com interação com bruxos de todos os confins do país??

Isso mesmo que você acabou de ler *Bruxos*!!

Talvez você já nos conheça ou talvez ainda não.

Se já nos conhece saberá que está prestes a voltar com um dos melhores passatempos das suas noites, e se não nos conhece ainda prepare-se para entrar em um dos melhores RPGs dos últimos tempos!!!

Estamos voltando com tudo e esperamos vocês em nossos salões!!!

💚💙❤️💛

[zontco]

Preeeepppppppppp.... #backinthegmseat #5e #rpggeek https://www.instagram.com/p/BxbVub_j_2Z/?igshid=1bnn49y8zluen

[kimgunhee-blog]

Legends of the five rings #rpg #trpg #geek #nerd #rpggeek #dnd #tabletop https://www.instagram.com/p/BsUPm89jFbh/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=csu64ki0k6ub

[skullsplitterdice]

Roll for perception! Click Here to Read the Full Blog Post! #skullsplitterdice #dnd #dungeonsanddragons #tabletopgames #advanceddungeonsanddragons #dandd #rpg #roleplayinggame #tabletoprpg #gaming #gamer #RPGgeek #nerdy #DungeonsandDragons #geeky #tabletoprpg #tabletopgame #fantasy #d20dic #gamergram #postoftheday #oldschoolgames #oldschoolgamers #pathfinderrpg #Pathfinder

[cezacherl]

I'm pretty simple when it comes to my grail items. They're all either games that I had but had to sell to buy groceries for my kids back in the day. Or games that I was too broke to buy when they came out. This was the 20th anniversary, expanded edition of my favorite game from my favorite game publishers. It's still print on demand, today. But I'm just an artist, so I try to trade art for unnecessary desirables like this one. And I finally had the opportunity! If anyone else has games on their hands that would like to trade unnecessaries for unecessaries, I'm looking for anything from TSR's Marvel Superheroes run, Chaosium books, and White Wolf's Wraith and Victorian Vampire books. Otherwise, you can get 15% Off everything in my store for labor day weekend & support my family's geek habits thattaway. :) 🌒 🌕 🌘 #gamer #gamergeek #gamerboy #roleplayer #roleplaying #roleplayers #tabletop #tabletoproleplaying #rpg #rpggeek #geek #geekculture #geeklife #artswap #arttradesopen #arttrade #artist #vtm #vtmfamilie #vampire #vampirethemasquerade #wraiththeoblivion #wraith #tsr #marvelsuperheroes #tsrmarvelsuperheroesrpg #chaosium #vampyr #rpgbook #rpgbooks https://www.instagram.com/p/CTaCVGDFhiV/?utm_medium=tumblr

[aficionadosdofantastico]

O tão aclamado e premiado jogo de mesa RPG sueco Tales From The Loop (Contos do Loop) está com seus dias contados para chegar ao Brasil. ⠀ Vale lembrar que a edição brasileira chega aqui em 8 de agosto, através de uma parceria selada entre a Editora Sagen @sageneditora e a Galápagos Jogos @galapagosjogos , o qual já se encontra disponível para pré-venda por R$ 200,00 na plataforma digital da Amazon Brasil @amazonbrasil. ⠀ Lançado em 2017 pela Free League, Tales from the Loop ganhou 5 Ennie Awards, o Oscar dos jogos de tabuleiro e RPG, naquele mesmo ano nas seguintes categorias: Melhor Cenário, Melhor Arte Interior, Melhor Edição, Produto do Ano e Melhor Jogo. ⠀ A versão brasileira segue o mesmos moldes da edição original norte-americana, com sua belíssima capa dura e dois incríveis panoramas visuais, sendo um na ilha original da Suécia e outro no deserto de Nevada, nos EUA com quatro aventuras em modos de jogo, prontas para os rpgistas desfrutarem. ⠀ Dentro do jogo, temos a presença protagonizada por crianças e adolescentes que investigam os mistérios que sondam as afastadas regiões pelas redondezas em raios de Km que cercam a instalação super secreta conhecida como "Loop", sendo projetado em um cenário retrofuturista de 1980, por este motivo temos o slogan intitulado " Um RPG nos anos 80 que nunca foram". ⠀ Em Contos do Loop, quer se mostrar, como um dos temas centrais do jogo, a forma como os adultos ignoram completamente um abismo de mistérios, não se importando ou não enxergando os muitos enigmas e segredos que giram em volta de pequenas cidades do interior, distanciadas completamente das grandes metrópoles e centros urbanos. Eles simplesmente não notam, não "vêem" o que as crianças vêem. ⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀ ⠀ #talesfromthelooprpg #rpg #jogosrpg #jogosderpg #jogosdemesa #jogodemesa #rpgistas #geek #geekbrasil #geeks #geekbr #geeklife #rpggeek #geekrpg #comunidadegeek #comunidadenerd #culturapop #nerdbr #rpgnerd #nerdbrasil #culturanerd #culturageek #nerdices #talesfromtheloop #contosdoloop #sageneditora #galápagosjogos #freeleague #simonstålenhag #simonstalenhag (em The Loop) https://www.instagram.com/p/CBGhKZIDYup/?igshid=jkmo9ekkhzrs

[open-hearth-rpg]

Loresheets: Great RPG Mechanics #RPGMechanics: Week Five

In the early 2000s I didn’t really have a FLGS that I went to for rpgs. One was pretty much a miniatures-only place and the other I avoided because of bad past experiences. So instead I got a lot of things by mail order– I say mail order rather than online because in some places I literally had to send them a check. I still don’t remember how I heard about Weapons of the Gods. This was pre RPGGeek or G+. I suspect I followed a link from something Robin Laws or Ken Hite reviewed or mentioned. 

At the time I was in the middle of playing Exalted, but also fascinated by the idea of doing a high fantasy wuxia game which could emulate Jade Man Comics I’d read in the 1990s: Force of Buddha’s Palm, Oriental Heroes, etc. After waiting a long time, the game actually shipped– in a preview form for Gen Con 2005. Eventually the full glossy book arrived and it was…

…a lot: colorful, wild, and imaginative. The text contained more ideas than I’d ever seen, presented in new and novel ways. This was the first time I’d encountered the work of Jenna Katerin Moran. I hadn’t seen the first or second edition of Nobilis at that time But if you know her work you can feel it throughout. In particular the approach to the setting material. 

Because Weapons of the Gods is, in addition to being deep in non-Western cultural elements, a licensed game. There’s a massive backstory for a world which pretty definitively players will have no idea about. Let’s leave aside the issue of the complexity and sheer weirdness of the mechanical system for WotG combat (seriously I have read it several times and played it twice and couldn’t explain it to anyone). The book tackles the question of how to present the world in an interesting way. 

Just about everything that’s talked about, the usual backstory sections of an rpg, is presented as a loresheet. Basically it is a tight block of information about the topic (the factions, special weapons, historical events, famous people, mystical happenings, philosophies, sexuality, etc). 

And for just about every one of those things you can buy yourself into that story. You have a currency called Destiny for character creation and development. You can spend that to shape your place in the world. As (name-dropping) Ken Hite pointed out to me, the brilliant thing here is how it monetizes the setting. 

For example, Destiny Binding: Brothers talks about the bond between male siblings. For 1+ destiny you can “increase the role of one of your elder brothers in the story. This makes his motivations more complex, gives more resources to offer you, and makes him more troublesome for you.” You can also do this for your younger brother or spend more to make yourself a middle child and both sides create complexities. There’s also an option for broken familial bonds. 

This is pretty conventional but there are other things, like being associated with divine figures. Take for example the legendary concubine Kung Min. If you’re descended from her you have a chaotic influence on the world of the wulin and you can use the strength of your lovers as your own. There’s material for having reincarnated souls, for homosexuality, for Confucianism, and hundreds more. Each one of these also offers discounted costs on related destinies. The designers present a web of connections which binds everything together. 

Everywhere there are brief drops of setting which radiate interesting ideas– and then the book tells you how to tie it to your character. It is chaotic, messy, hard to follow, and extremely ambitious. I adore it. It makes Weapons of the Gods an absolute pleasure to read and bounce around in. I’m not saying it's a great game, but it offers a new way to connect players to the world. I can almost imagine building a set of world-specific background moves for something like PbtA or FitD.

[sk3tchisworld]

So Dreamscape is a taken name. By a game that is only mentioned on rpggeek, but still it exists.

And DreamCraft was found on the same site in 2020.

So, now I have make it Sleeping Willow, which is fine with me.

Just fine.

I'm speed-running this game creation bit, but I'm learning so much about balance and mechanics. I thought I knew, but oh boy. Could I have gone for a tiny one-page game? Yes. But also no. Condensing replayability to a single page is actually really hard.

But with 13 days left I've employed 'Done is better than perfect'. Always moving forward, never looking back. Do I have a long list left, yes! Might need to double up some things each day.

Sleeping Willow is about being a Dreamcrafter who weaves dreams for weary travellers. You craft dreams by playing blackjack. If you bust, you must card duel nightmares! And when you want to hang out in the boughs of the Sleeping Willow with the other residents, you play poker. Oracles and resolution is baked into the entire process with nothing extra from the player.

[illuminatinggames]

Playing some Ashen Stars. One of my very favorite RPGs, up there with Numenera and Night's Black Agents. Terrific game setting, a nice simple Gumshoe rulesset combined with a fair amount of fun crunchy setting detail. Really entertaining Star Trek-flavored space combat system. If you're even a casual fan of procedural sci-fi like Star Trek in all its many incarnations, I really can't recommend this highly enough. #ashenstars #pelgranepress #robindlaws #rpg #rpggeek