Recent content by pemerton

Is that meant to be Mythic Bastionlands? If so, and if you have play experience - or other ideas about the game - feel free to post in this thread: Mythic Bastionland - initial impressions, and making a Realm

I guess, having just gone in to bat for Prince Valiant over Pendragon, that I can hardly quibble with someone else taking a position at odds with the received wisdom . . .

I think I'm the odd one out - not just between us, but across the whole RPGing community - in ranking Prince Valiant above Pendragon. But I am (reasonably) serious about it. And as I continue to cultivate my interest in Mythic Bastionland, I think the likelihood of me ever spending time with...

Ahem . . . perhaps you meant Prince Valiant?

Yeah, someone can be revolutionary (as in, upending or transforming their field) without being a revolutionary. I think Baker is a pretty perceptive designer. You can see this in the Anyway blogs from 15 to 20 years ago, where he is working through his satisfactions and dissatisfactions with...

I ran a session of In A Wicked Age for a couple of kids and a parent, who I think would all count as "casual" players. It worked fine. The kids in particular tended to use the compromise mechanic for resolving conflicts in ways that de-escalated a bit, and made things a bit more "comfortable"...

The art and layout for Agon 2e played a role in my decision to buy the book: <AGON - An Epic TTRPG by Evil Hat Productions>. I didn't know I was going to buy it until I saw it in the shop.

It depends on the game. Eg in our Traveller game, the character are all part of a ship's crew, and so are all "there" where the ship is. I quite like the Torchbearer 2e rule for this (from the Scholar's Guide, p 25): If your group plays an ongoing game and a player misses a session, they get a...

They're like a gibbering mouther, except some of them find gibbering to be too much effort! (Or something like that . . .)

Agreed. A lot of RPG design and play also inclines towards something other than rising conflict across a moral line. White Plume Mountain (as an example of the dungeon crawl paradigm) is an example; so are the CoC-esque mysteries that I have on my shelf. An interesting example is something...

I agree with this. I'm less sure about ths!

I think there are some accounts of old conversations that exaggerate some of what was said. As an example, Edwards, in his "story now" essay, observed that Techniques do not map 1:1 to Creative Agenda, but combinations of Techniques do support or obstruct Creative Agendas. . . . For...

I've thought a bit more about this. The "Oddpocrypha" - that is, the examples of play with commentary - includes this, as part of the entry on Exploration: Tal: While we’re travelling can I search for any other travellers we could speak to? I can see through my raven’s eyes remember. Ref...

I think what you're saying here is close to @Fenris-77. I was making a different point: that a lot of commentary on "narrative" RPGing from those who seem not to be especially into it emphasise (so called) "narrative" mechanics - roughly, player-side fiat (either for situation, or for...

I can see that.