Tag Archives: RPG

Articles, The Independents

FIST: ULTRA EDITION Review – Paranormal Cold War Mercs

8 Comments

Now: the second half of the twentieth century. The powers that be are locked in a tense nuclear standoff, and the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Away from the watchful eye of national intelligence, a cadre of exceptional misfits is assembled. These soldiers of fortune are uniquely equipped for covert and unusual operations.

In these uncertain times, the line between science and superstition has been broken, and the new arms race is only beginning. You, or your associates, may be faced with weapons, tactics, and actors unlike any you have ever seen. For a price, those exceptional misfits can help. 

When you’re all out of options, it’s time to call FIST. Continue reading FIST: ULTRA EDITION Review – Paranormal Cold War Mercs →

Articles, Meet the Campaign

Meet the Campaign: Mecha Wasteland – The Crew of the Ulaid

3 Comments

Every so often, I get the craving to dive into the mecha genre, and each time I have thought about introducing it to some kind of roleplaying. This has stretched through freeform play by post, play by email and even a brief dabbling with the Mekton Zeta RPG. However, as the years have passed the people who I had played with have moved onto other things. While scratching the itch, I looked up the interview that Seamus did with the team behind Mechasys. It was an inspiration and while it doesn’t do everything, it is broad enough that I can do a lot of things and I would really love to play it at some point. With that said, the old formats I played in don’t exist anymore and realization has dawned that the most likely I am to see it in action is if I have run a game myself. A bit rested from my first completed attempt at GMing I began to bandy about a few “what-ifs”. What started as playing around as character creation led to thinking about how I would frame a game…and from there, I leapfrogged into another idea: showing how a campaign can be built.

Continue reading Meet the Campaign: Mecha Wasteland – The Crew of the Ulaid →
Articles, Crowdfunding Carnival

Crowdfunding Carnival: September, 2023

2 Comments

Welcome to the Crowdfunding Carnival for September! There are a lot of games on Kickstarter this month; the post-GenCon recalibration has happened just as expected. Beyond that, there’s a large number of big campaigns; beyond the ones we cover here there’s a big Free League campaign for a supplement to The One Ring as well as a new collection of Game Master Advice.

There’s something else going on here, though. Is it getting…spooky? It’s not just vampire commandos and weird wizards, it really does seem like Halloween is starting earlier every year. Check out what’s on offer this month, and see if you agree.

Continue reading Crowdfunding Carnival: September, 2023 →
Articles, Editorial

Fantasy World Review

2 Comments

While Apocalypse World was the starting line for Powered by the Apocalypse, Dungeon World was what got the ruleset to really take off. By adapting the rules of the perennially popular Dungeons and Dragons as well as showing gamers what it looked like when Apocalypse World was hacked, Dungeon World not only moved significantly more copies than Apocalypse World but also kickstarted the popularity of PbtA in general. Now, years later, Dungeon World’s somewhat inartful mushing of Apocalypse World and D&D together is looked upon less fondly, given years of innovation and expansion of the PbtA ruleset. When you combine that with the checkered behavior of one of its authors, Dungeon World is a game that has sent many of its fans looking for a replacement.

Oddly, straight-up fantasy has not seen a lot of entrants into PbtA. There is Fellowship, but that is designed around a specific Tolkienesque sort of story. There is The Sword, The Crown, and the Unspeakable Power, but while that plays to Game of Thrones and popular dark fantasy themes, actually playing the game demands engaging in a unique and quite adversarial experience. No, the sort of fantasy romp typified by D&D but also offered in games like Forbidden Lands, RuneQuest, and even GURPS Dungeon Fantasy, is not really present to the same degree in PbtA as it is in other places. Maybe it’s the OSR attracting the sort of small press hackers and designers who want to write fantasy, or maybe Dungeon World’s shadow is too long. Either way, there’s a new fantasy PbtA game in town.

Continue reading Fantasy World Review →
Articles, Editorial

What GMs Want

Leave a comment

Starting last year and continuing into this one, there have been stories about a “dungeon master shortage” in the TTRPG hobby, specifically meaning D&D Fifth Edition. D&D rocketed up in popularity in the last decade or so since Fifth Edition was first released, but that means that some of the game’s liabilities have finally caught up with it. D&D was never great on rules clarity, but Fifth Edition, while aiming for simplicity on the player side of things, finally and completely left the DM in the lurch as the rules for that side of the screen were either executed poorly or, in many cases, removed entirely. Given the edition’s rise in popularity, the demand for DMs has completely outstripped the pool of game veterans who cut their teeth on earlier editions and could use their experience to fill in the gaps left in the 5e Dungeon Master’s Guide.

While there is no acute GM shortage across the rest of the hobby, the travails of D&D have brought the game-running role back into focus. Many indie games over the last decade have eschewed having a single player take on running the game (called both GMless, implying no need for any facilitation, and GMful, implying there is still a need for facilitation but it is split amongst multiple players), but the traditional “one GM-many players” paradigm still rules the roost across the spectrum of popular RPG designs. As the D&D hobby is finding out quite painfully, if you’re singling out one player to take on more responsibility, you’ve got to help them out.

Continue reading What GMs Want →
Articles, The Independents

Fabula Ultima Review: A Golden Table Talk JRPG

40 Comments

Epic stories of larger-than-life heroes destined to accomplish great deeds fighting against fearsome villains and tragic antagonists! Fantasy worlds brimming with magic, wondrous locations, and uniquely bizarre monsters! Challenging battles that will call for clever tactics, cooperation with allies, and tricks up your sleeve to win! If you’ve played Japanese roleplaying games like Bravely Default, Chrono Trigger, Granblue Fantasy, Ocotopath Traveler, or (duh) Final Fantasy, the premise might be quite familiar indeed. This, however, is no video game. Neither will it take you through a predetermined story, however many branches it may have, thought up by writers and enabled by coders you’ll never meet. Instead, grab some dice and prepare to put your own tabletop twist on the genre you love, with a story and world of your own creation. Welcome to Fabula Ultima, created by Emanuele Galletto and published by Need Games!

Continue reading Fabula Ultima Review: A Golden Table Talk JRPG →