This week is Independence Day in the US, and here are some opportunities to declare independence from cost constraints as you try to build your RPG collection. As usual we have Bundle of Holding and DriveThruRPG sales being highlighted, as well as a free product that’s definitely worth checking out.
All posts by Aaron Marks
Kickstarter Wonk: July, 2019
It’s July, and the Kickstarters are out in force before GenCon! Well, it was actually a fairly sparse list on the publisher front, though it’s worth noting that there’s a new edition of Chivalry and Sorcery, a supplement for the latest edition of Torg, and a new edition of Aberrant, to boot! Still, those are all editions of existing games, and Kickstarter Wonk is about the new stuff. I’ve painstakingly separated the wheat from the chaff and brought you ten games that should all be pretty solid…or at least pretty to look at.
Adventure Log: Dungeons and Dragons, Part 14
The party was invited back to the governor’s estate to help interrogate Paul. The stories of the wizards crafting a gate were corroborated, though it sounded like Paul either didn’t agree with or didn’t believe the reasoning of his compatriots. Either way, it was a spirited argument and too many available teleport artifacts that caused the malfunction, opening the gate maybe a third of the way and casting Paul into the Interface. Paul wasn’t imprisoned, per se, but he was held in an office in the administrative district of Third City for safekeeping.
Continue reading Adventure Log: Dungeons and Dragons, Part 14
System Hack: Cyberpunk Chimera Attributes and Skills
So we’ve stated some design goals, and we’ve set a baseline with an in-depth review of Cyberpunk 2020. Now, it’s time to get into the weeds. As I stated in the design goals, I want to create a game inspired by Cyberpunk 2020. As such, most of these articles will revisit one or more mechanics from that game. That said, after considering the implications of these mechanics, I will more often than not rip them apart. Want to see us journey from nine stats and a d10-based resolution mechanic to three stats and a dice pool? Read on.
Continue reading System Hack: Cyberpunk Chimera Attributes and Skills
Tabletop Gamers: Pay Attention to Cyberpunk 2077
If you’re in and around the gaming space, you’ve probably heard something about Cyberpunk 2077 by now. The game, being developed by CD Projekt Red (CDPR), is the company’s next major release and is based on tabletop RPG intellectual property, specifically Cyberpunk 2020 by R. Talsorian Games. It is also a game receiving a lot of attention, most notably last Sunday (June 9th) when Keanu Reeves took the stage at the E3 conference to announce the game’s release date next April. Now, this is a tabletop RPG blog, but Cyberpunk 2077 is a game that, love it or hate it, you should pay attention to. Extrapolating from the sales success of CDPR’s previous game, The Witcher 3, and assuming that the game is at least good enough to partially live up to the hype, Cyberpunk 2077 will be the largest TTRPG-to-video game crossover to date, and that may have some big impacts on the TTRPG audience in the coming years.
Continue reading Tabletop Gamers: Pay Attention to Cyberpunk 2077
Bargain Bin Gaming: June, 2019
Kickstarter is like placing a bet that a product (like a game) is going to be good. While you can hedge your bets, you never know until your reward arrives whether it’s as good as you wanted or not. Sales are the exact opposite. You know what you’re getting, and you know it’s for less than list price! While I’ve been covering new RPGs coming through Kickstarter, the sources of sales for tabletop RPGs are getting better and deserve some love. I’m taking a look at Bundle of Holding as well as DriveThruRPG to give a sample of some high quality, low price games out there right now.
Kickstarter Wonk: June, 2019
It’s June, and you know what that means: RPG Kickstarters are in full gear! There’s a bunch of games out here fighting for recognition and funding before hitting the convention circuit, and that only means more choice for you, fine readers. This top ten is about half of the campaigns I read through, and there were way more good ones than bad ones. Still, these ten are the ones I think you should take a closer look at.
The Independents: Heroes All
Superhero stories are at their most interesting when talking about conflicts that aren’t easily knocked down with super-strength or a utility belt of gadgets. The most memorable superheroes across every continuity are those who are both relatable and who must struggle to earn their victories. As our readers have seen with Seamus’s High Impact Heroics Adventure Log, there are newer supers games like Masks which do a great job of emphasizing the human aspects of the superheroic. Cut from a similar cloth is Heroes All, a new game by Brandon Sichling. Heroes All is built around the core conflicts that make or break a superheroic character. By pairing the creation of an antagonist with the player’s protagonist, Heroes All creates an immediate conflict for every player right out of the gate.
Adventure Log: Dungeons and Dragons, Part 13
What? Whaaaaat? Really putting the wonkiness in Wonk here, after last week’s little doozy. But yeah, there are still a couple Adventure Logs left before I put a feather in the cap of my last attempt at running Dungeons and Dragons. This is the penultimate Adventure Log, from a series of sessions run in August of last year that led to an intriguing conclusion.
Continue reading Adventure Log: Dungeons and Dragons, Part 13
Maybe…Don’t Play D&D?
Earlier this year Dungeons and Dragons, and, as a result, the role-playing game as a formal, published form, turned 45. It is one of the youngest mediums in entertainment; as a point of comparison the first video game patent was issued in 1948, making that medium over 70. And like video games did with arcades and Atari, role-playing games are beginning to enjoy mainstream recognition, several decades after their genesis. There’s another similarity between video games, consoles specifically, and role-playing games: the first mainstream video game console outsold every competitor it had more than ten to one, just like the first mainstream role-playing game. In video games that was the Atari 2600, and in role-playing games that’s Dungeons and Dragons.
Cannibal Halfling Gaming 