Reading
Not books, no, I seem to have given that up. I'm doing hours of reading a day, though.
Over the last month I've read a dozen Actual plays, and more threads on or about Kingmaker, the particular Pathfinder Adventure Path we're on. Focused on hex-exploration, and with a fairly deadly wandering encounter table (something my players didn't really face because I was incapable of rolling the random chance to trigger such an encounter). Why not just make one happen? Because in this campaign I'm trying to play things straight from the hip, using a much more "old school" mentality, and not creating narrative encounters to suit my purpose.
Which has lead me to a series of blogs about OSR (Old School Rules) gaming. Some of them are pretty opinionated, and some of those opinions are interesting, if not exactly what I'm used to in a game. Witness Hack & Slash, who a year ago spent a lot of time talking about Player Agency in an OSR context. Now Player Agency is something "modernistas" talk about quite a lot, however the focus of Challenge Rating and Party-appropriate tailored encounters that we've seen ever since D&D 3.0 hit the shelves is, he argues, stripping parties of agency. The fallacy of the Spherical Cow was certainly amusing and thought provoking as well.
Now it's time to clean up and go grab a drink down-town, because it's International Drinking Day, and that's what one does.
Doug.
Over the last month I've read a dozen Actual plays, and more threads on or about Kingmaker, the particular Pathfinder Adventure Path we're on. Focused on hex-exploration, and with a fairly deadly wandering encounter table (something my players didn't really face because I was incapable of rolling the random chance to trigger such an encounter). Why not just make one happen? Because in this campaign I'm trying to play things straight from the hip, using a much more "old school" mentality, and not creating narrative encounters to suit my purpose.
Which has lead me to a series of blogs about OSR (Old School Rules) gaming. Some of them are pretty opinionated, and some of those opinions are interesting, if not exactly what I'm used to in a game. Witness Hack & Slash, who a year ago spent a lot of time talking about Player Agency in an OSR context. Now Player Agency is something "modernistas" talk about quite a lot, however the focus of Challenge Rating and Party-appropriate tailored encounters that we've seen ever since D&D 3.0 hit the shelves is, he argues, stripping parties of agency. The fallacy of the Spherical Cow was certainly amusing and thought provoking as well.
Now it's time to clean up and go grab a drink down-town, because it's International Drinking Day, and that's what one does.
Doug.