The Man in the Black Velvet Mask

October 21st, 2006

Hello, all, :)

And welcome to my latest diatribe on game play and design techniques. This little essay is called:

A Study on Stances, Authorities, and Shared Narration Rights

GM: You are attacked by a man in a black velvet mask.
Player: I spin around and strike at his face, tearing his mask right off!
GM: Guess what, it’s Barnabas, the stable keeper!
Player: No kidding? Holy shit!
(Adapted from an example provided by Ron Edwards in this thread.)

Aside: Most, if not all, of what I say here can be gleaned directly from that thread, by the way, so really, you should go read it. This essay is really just my attempt at explaining these concepts in my own words, as a way of fostering my own understanding, as well as that of any hypothetical persons that might still be a tad lost about all this stuff. So, really, go read the thread before you read this. :)

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Posted in Actual Play, Game Design, Gaming | 5 Comments »

A Wedding Tale

October 18th, 2006

Hey, all, :)

I’m starting off a new post category, for all cool things related to friends and/or family, but not related to gaming. It would be sort of cool if I had decided to do this, and then found something interesting to post right away. Even cooler, though, is the fact that I have something that I absolutely must post, which is what drove me to reorganize the categories in the first place.

A friend of mine got married the other day.

So what, that happens every day, right? Only, this wedding was… different.

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Posted in Friends, Non-Gaming | 1 Comment »

Trackbacks Rule The World!

September 21st, 2006

Hey, :)

They just do…

Cheers,
J.

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“El Fuego” Does It Again

September 16th, 2006

Hello, all, :)

Since about a few months back, I began noticing a disturbing trend: more and more people were listening to my experiences, then turning to me non-challantly and saying, “meh, that’s not role-playing”. Invariably, they then proceed to “explain” to me what role-playing is, and how it needs this and that and those other things like, say, a Game Master, and conversation generally degenerates pretty quickly from there on.

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Posted in Gaming | 4 Comments »

Ron explains The Forge

September 14th, 2006

Ahey, :)

Clinton and I [...] want to keep the Forge’s function right where it started – finding people in the canebrake, struggling with their designs, or having produced an amazing design but not knowing what to do with it. We like it working best and most for the guys with a crappy Geocities website and a neat game idea, who aren’t quite sure how the internet can help them further.

Read this thread. The relevant post is Ron’s third post in the thread, specifically, post # 18.

Enlightening.

Cheers,
J.

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A Hero Moves On

September 11th, 2006

Hey, all, :)

Duval, the elven Ammenite with a conscience, is no more.

In the brief days of his existence, he participated in a full moon feast, chased a manipulative rascal, made friends, saved lives, got fallen in love with, was imprisoned, rescued, ambushed, fought, and was called a traitor, and then a hero.

In his finest hour, he single-handedly fought and defeated over fifteen of his own countrymen, who, acting on the orders of the commander of a much more sizeable force, were poised to stage a large-scale invasion of his friends’ land.

Through his actions, he stopped the invasion on its tracks and went on to end the war itself. Of course, in the long run, the Ammenites can’t be trusted, but for the time being, at least, the Khaleans can sleep soundly.

And when it was all over, he walked off into the sunset, never to be seen again.

Actual Play at The Forge, as usual, with some substantive content regarding the game play, and yes, I’m being immodest about it. ;)

Cheers,
J.

Posted in Actual Play, Gaming | 2 Comments »

The System Monkey meets the Fruitful Void

September 5th, 2006

Ahoy, :)

Deepness!

Yeah, I’ve been looking for deepness to write about for a while, because, you know, I like deepness, but the fact of the matter is that, of late, my gaming sessions have been all fun and wholesome and fulfilling and whatnot, and as such, there has been no need for deepness.

And yet, it’s about time I try to come up with something deep to write about, and so this is it:

Think about the games you like to play, and about how you like to play them. Do you like to go all out and explore the hell out of the system, trusting that the game play will be satisfactory, or do you like to have your play be about something other than the system, trusting that the system will support you?*

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Posted in Game Design, Gaming | 8 Comments »

August in the City

August 25th, 2006

Hey, :)

Man! I used to love Lisbon in August. There’s like nobody here.

But now, half my gaming buddies have jobs and all, which means they have vacations and stuff, and you know what? Nobody’s here!

This sucks! My D&D campaign totally froze, right when I was getting ready to take it in a new direction, at the collective request of my players, no less.

Fortunately, September is upon us and the next session has finally been scheduled. Yay!

In the meantime, Joshua “El Fuego” BishopRoby posted some wisdom that should not be missed by anyone who wants to be a game designer.

Cheers,
J.

Posted in Gaming | 3 Comments »

Spambots Ahoy

August 12th, 2006

Hey, all, :)

Ok, I’m getting just a little bit sick of flagging viagra and cialis sales site URL posts as spam.

Also, I want people to be able to post here and to see their comments online immediately, without having to wait for me to say that, yeah, they’re ok. Mostly, I don’t want people to think I might not want to hear what they have to say.

Of course, the operative word there is people. I really don’t want to sell phentermine here, mostly because I just don’t know what phentermine is… (and before you post a comment to this effect, I’d like to keep it that way, please, thank you vey much!)

In that spirit, I’m going to be trying out a number of Word Press plugins in the next few days. If you detect any problems, please bear with me whilst I endeavour to fix them.

Cheers,
J.

Posted in Administrivia | 2 Comments »

Shadow of Yesterday AP Report Up

August 9th, 2006

Hello, all, :)

After a looooong delay, I’ve finally managed to post an Actual Play report on our TSoY sessions during the most awesomest June Retreat.

The actual AP report lives here and is rather long.

Because it might be useful, I also posted the initial situation here.

Lastly, I posted all the keys we came up with here.

Also, this marks the end of my reporting regarding the retreat. I posted about My Life with Master here, about Torchbearer here, and about The 101 here and here.

Up next, I’ll be trying to collect some thoughts I’ve had about Dogs in the Vineyard, which have been gathering dust in the back of my mind.

Cheers,
J.

Posted in Actual Play, Gaming | Comments Off

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