In fact, everyone in those boats had been hit. Four of the occupants of each boat were Africans, in fairly elaborate costumes. These made them look as if they had about two feet of hair all over them, with gloves and shoes that mounted large claws, and huge headpieces with wooden fronts in the...
I'm currently playing in a Day After Ragnarok campaign, and the world map in that is extremely evocative. It shows how much the world changed in the apocalypse, and inspires me with scenario ideas.
Art is not very important to me, but it can be influential. That sounds contradictory, but a picture sometimes has a huge influence on the way a species gets played. My best example is the picture of a Gif in the first edition of Spelljammer for AD&D 2e. The monocle. and details of the uniform...
It seems to me that there's an important difference between "this scenario is about solving a mystery" and "the mystery in this scenario is part of a larger story arc." In the second case, some things about the mystery are predetermined, and much of the significance of the mystery is tied into...
One of the important forces in game selection is "We want it to be just as much fun as the old days, when we were new to TTRPGs." Parts of that are impossible: no experience can be as much fun as the first time you got it to work right, and it was really cool. To achieve that feeling again, you...