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As an RPG consumer, I totally depend on quality reviews to help me navigate the massive deluge of products we're seeing at the moment. As a publisher, thorough reviews of our products help lessen the chance that a customer will be disappointed with their purchase, and that's a win for everyone...

I think games were traditionally designed with the idea that players made their characters separately, so adventures needed to be written with a wide array of character possibilities in mind (D&D still mostly follows this model). I like how newer games (not just Free League) put more emphasis on...

As you say, the “magic” happens when we stop playing to optimize the outcome in the game sense of “winning”. One alternative is to view our actions through the lens of “that’s what my character would do”, but that too can create un-fun situations for the other participants. In the end, maybe...

Just a quick heads up: DriveThru’s New Year Bundles are up, great offerings this year, and I’m happy to report that Elemental is one of them!

For those interested in learning more, reviewer A.R. Kavli just dropped a very in-depth flip-through video review of the core book (for a shorter review, there is also Charles Dunwoody's review on this site).

Agree with the OP. I think the issue is that, consciously or not, most RPG books are written for the solitary reader, rather than someone running a game. Optimizing for quick reference at the table and conjuring a scene with concise, evocative language, is more akin to writing a technical...

Just a quick addendum to say that the Elemental core book and player's guide are discounted as part of DriveThruRPG’s “small press spotlight sale”, which includes many other designers worth supporting and ends in…22 hours and 24 minutes :)

Thank you @Charles Dunwoody for the great overview! As one of the designers, I’m happy to answer any other questions about the game. Also, a quick heads-up: The Elemental core book is DriveThruRPG’s Deal of the Day…TODAY…and just went on sale now.

Happy to address that, as well as any other questions. In a nutshell: Elemental uses opposed Attribute + Skill + 1d6 rolls that explode on a natural 6 (i.e. if you roll a "6", you get a second roll to add to the total). If you roll higher than the opposing roll, you succeed. If you roll lower...

Will do!

My favorite D&D artist. Love the colors, textures and sense of movement in his paintings.

Just found and read this. Love the atmosphere, very Lovecraftian. Excellent first effort!! Trust me, the second one is easier :) Added to my "to run" pile...

Narrative games aren't for every group, but I admire MCG for always innovating around how you can approach RPGs.

These look like fun. If the goal is to ease people into D&D, it might have been good to include pregens.

What this suggests is that, as you point out, they've built successful game lines on the back of published adventures, which I appreciate and applaud. I'd much rather see lots of adventures I can run as is or mine for ideas, rather than the splat-fest we used to have in the 2e/3e days. But as...

It saddens me to hear people complaining about how published adventures "require more prep than coming up with something on my own" or aren't as imaginative/consistent/well-crafted/etc....not because it isn't true, but because it unfortunately is true. Published adventures can and should be...

While D&D may skew towards having too few GMs vs. players, for smaller games my experience suggests the opposite problem (I'm always seeing GMs saying they can't get players to try such and such a game). So maybe part of the solution is to find ways to get more players to try non-D&D games.

I haven't read the book so can't comment on the quality of adventures, but I love the format, short stand-alone adventures are always useful for dropping into campaigns or using as one-offs or just looting for ideas, NPCs, monsters etc. It seems like the book would be even easier for folks to...

Yep, and if there's anyone who can pull off a PvP scenario, it's Greg Stolze...definitely getting this one.

Nice to see someone succeed the old-fashioned way. No kickstarters, no promises, no weight of expectation, just make things people like and build on that success. KS is an amazing tool and it has opened the floodgates for indie developers, but it's not the only viable path.