I wrote up a new conflict resolution system based on my idea of jockeying for position (advantage) before finally resolving it with a die roll ( Read more... )

Out of nowhere, I came up with this conflict resolution system. I'm gonna use it for the FRPG that I am writing. If anyone has seen a game that does anything like it, let me know, because I want to study it. Here are the basics without getting too specific about attributes and crap like that.

( Read more... )

If this topic seems familiar to you, it's probably because this is a perennial subject for me. I revisit my goals for an FRPG every so often, and I'd like to think that my vision is getting clearer.

I've been working on two RPGs. One is Verge, of course, and I'm becoming known in indie game circles as "the guy who hasn't finished Verge yet," so I ( Read more... )

The last couple months have been an orgasmic series of waves of busy. The day job has been intense but I just (very successfully) closed a major project. There was GenCon (and the day-job stuff that had to be done before I went to GenCon, and the day-job stuff that was behind when I got back from GenCon). There was Williamsburg with Steph. There ( Read more... )

It dawned on me the other day that my Towerlands project is a classic fantasy heartbreaker. I mean, I've known this all along, but it had not occurred to me what that meant for my game design ( Read more... )

In Towerlands, players get to make stuff up about the world, but they don't have to, and the GM doesn't have to use what they make up, but there are bribes to get him to ( Read more... )

Let me tell you how I arrived here, before telling you where "here" is. I whined a bit about "standard" races. Why does everyone use the same racial patterns for their settings without really adding anything unique? Here you have the chance to paint a fantasy world. Use bright colors and a diverse palette ( Read more... )

So orbis_terrarum has been posting lots of really compelling world background for her D&D campaign. She's been talking about dwarves lately and it made me think about what I want to do with dwarves -- if anything -- in Towerlands. Or elves, really. Or "humans." Do we need these D&D-standard races for a new fantasy setting ( Read more... )

I had this idea this morning for that game I'm not writing. I thought it was cool and original, then as I started writing this post I realized that I saw pretty much the same thing in Spirit of the Century. Oops! I'm gonna steal it anyway. I may also have been influenced by Guy Shalev's recent Trolls game in a vague way.

So Towerlands will ( Read more... )

In appearance, fey look like small people, a few feet tall at most. Even the adults retain a sort of childish look ( Read more... )