A year or so of craft beer obsession and a couple of disappointing St Patrick's day outings in past years had me unenthused about my usual cross town Irish pub expedition, so Morgan's invitation to play a St Pat's one off for Actual People, Actual Play was an excellent substitute. We had all recently seen John Carter and were in the mood for some ( Read more... )

Without further ado, my OrcCon report, beginning with Friday:

Day After Ragnarok: ¡Técnicos En Contra De La Serpiente! (Afternoon)
Back in my wrestling-watching days, the luchadores were my usual favourites and Morgan asked me to watch an luchadore movie as prep (I found Santo in the Wax Museum (1963) at Aro St Video), so I was pretty psyched for ( Read more... )

Friday afternoon: Day After Ragnarok: ¡Técnicos En Contra De La Serpiente!
Morgan is the master of colour and he runs a mean FATE game. I haven't played in one of his for a while, so I'll kick off with some Luchadore action.

Friday Evening: Space Station OtrontoI don't really know much about Maschine Zeit, but creepy space horror + Jesse is a ( Read more... )

Once upon a time, Brennan Taylor turned his home campaign into a d20 game: Bulldogs. Then, some time later, he turned it into a FATE game. I have never played the d20 version, but we made characters for the FATE version several weeks ago and played a session of it a couple of weeks ago. It's good. Soft, and full of Aliens, but very light on ( Read more... )

Every year a band of San Deigo-area gamers hosts a small two-day convention at an office in a northern suburb of the city. This year the bulk of my Thursday night group went down to enjoy the fruits of the Hyph, as we dubbed it, and experience a bit of a road trip en routeThe southern road trip started with Strawberry donuts and fresh Tiger tails ( Read more... )

Know, O Prince, that between the years when the Serpent fell and the oceans drank America and the gleaming cities, and the rise of the Sons of Space, there was an Age undreamed of, when nations guttered low and flared brilliant across the poisoned world like dying stars - California and Texas each claiming the flag of the West, France torn asunder ( Read more... )

Last night was my first night playing in the Dresden Files campaign I've just joined. My character is Mešlamta-ea, the emissary of Nergal. I'm going to mostly give s story hour in this post, but I'll intersperse that with thoughts on play and the game ( Read more... )

It's been a couple of years since I made a character for a campaign (since mashugenah's Space Western game, I think), so I was excited to make one for a Dresden Files game last night. I think it was also the first time that I've made a character without looking at the book beforehand, so it was a good reminder of the evocative power of a well written game ( Read more... )

Christmas in Los Angeles is a like a gaming exile compared to Christmas in New Zealand. This is probably a combination of the relatively restricted pool of my gaming friends here, and the greater distances that people have to travel to see their families. But at any rate, I'm in Saratoga, CA, not Los Angeles at the moment. I know some gamers up ( Read more... )

I can't point to any one thing in Sean Nittner's Neoncon interview with Adam Jury, but it sparked some inspiration for A Certain Kind of Decision.

I'm still riding the post-Neoncon wave, and these are some of the games I'm excited about, in no particular order:

• Mike Olsen's simulation of 80s action movies, Action City! is a Gamechef finalist.
  
• At ( Read more... )