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Picture courtesy of Pixabay. Simplify, Don’t Add When I'm referencing "simple games" I'm specifically discussing games that are simple, but have some depth to them. I prefer to design simple games - games that are fundamentally simple in rules, though not in strategies. That said, simple...

Now that we’ve established the basics of simplifying a game, let’s work through how to make a game simple. Picture courtesy of Pixabay. The Simplification Checklist Simplicity in games consists of several tenets, which we’ll discuss in order. Remove trivial decisions: Trivial doesn’t mean...

Picture courtesy of Pixabay. Does anyone stick with a game anymore? As games have proliferated and entertainment options have become more numerous, it’s increasingly hard to get an audience to truly dedicate their time and effort to the game. This is important, because games rely on people...

Mercenary units were common in the pre-gunpowder era, and we hear their stories in some modern science fiction. Wouldn’t they show up in RPGs? Picture courtesy of Pixabay. Meet Your Merc Mercenary companies usually originated with troops from a specific region, but recruiting was typically a...

The longer the campaign, the more likely PCs become military strategists. Here’s the basics. Picture by RGodforest - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, File:Fire and movement.svg - Wikimedia Commons Welcome to the Big Leagues As an RPG campaign gets longer and longer, characters tend to become important...

Are there too many magic items in your campaign? Picture courtesy of Pixabay. “…and a +5 Sword” The nature of fantasy adventure gaming, as set out by the original Dungeons & Dragons, is that the collection of treasure meant acquiring magic items. In earlier versions of D&D, magic items were...

This isn’t exactly an idle discussion, as I’m currently writing an RPG design book, likely but not certainly to be published (next year) by the same company that published my Game Design book in 2012. (Why not certain? Size of market, among other things.) Their number one market is libraries, so...

Default setting. Not default game methods. Two very different things. "Baseline Assumptions of Fantasy RPGs" https://www.enworld.org/threads/worlds-of-design-baseline-assumptions-of-fantasy-rpgs.676258/ Contrast with science fiction: "Is there a default sci-fi setting"...

Nitpick: there were many fantasy games (though not RPGs) before D&D, and many, many fantasy stories, that took the default. Don't think D&D was the "beginning of everything", it was not.

My title was What would you expect in a Role-playing Game Design book?" You're right, the changed title is misleading. I do not control the title (or anything else, actually, editors do edit). The subtitle is clear. And if you actually read the article, isn't the intent clear despite the...

After the first paragraph (removed), this appears to be a discussion of what to put in a role-playing game. But the discussion is what to put in a book about designing role-playing games, which is quite a different thing. I agree that ToC, index, headers are important. An author does not...

"Rules of Play", one of the more well-known books about game design, stared with 80 pages defining what a game was, then admitted that by their definition RPGs are not games, and that they hadn't considered puzzles at all. Duh. Some RPGs, at least, do not have explicit victory conditions.

How big the market is is usually the big question. Publishers occupy different niches in the market. Not enough sales for one might be plenty for another. Unfortunately, there's no way to know how large a market might be: what people do is often different from what they SAY they'll do, so even a...

There are lots of books about playing tabletop role-playing games, but what makes a great book about designing one? Picture courtesy of Pixabay. Pros and Cons of Self-Publishing Nonfiction books aren’t what they used to be. My generation saw books as a treasure-trove of information, organized...

Fantasy worlds tend to remind us of medieval Europe in culture, rulership, even geography. Why? Map courtesy of Lew Pulsipher A Long Tradition Tabletop role-playing games have a long traditional of European medieval fantasy, starting with Dungeons & Dragons. While there were occasional nods to...

Picture courtesy of Pixabay. Maps Are Not Destiny Maps are important to games, and sometimes important to novels, although there are novelists like Glenn Cook who feel that maps restrict their freedom of action too much. I’m a big fan of maps, with a bookshelf full of (mostly historical)...

People play games to be entertained, and most people don’t like to work for their entertainment. But one person’s work can be another person’s pleasure. Picture courtesy of Pixabay. Checkmate When I was 15, I decided to “retire” (as I like to say) from playing chess. Not that I was an...

I'd add to the GM's many tasks, that they must adjust to different (sometime generational) preferences. Some players just won't like how your campaign works, and there's nothing you can do about that. For example, we have the players who think a secret door is "a dirty GM trick" vs those who...

As a continuing and ultimately patient activity, spying isn’t a good fit for typical fantasy or sci-fi RPGs. Picture courtesy of Pixabay. Tinker, Tailor, Caster, Spy Spies are an often long-term, frequently large-scale, speculative, form of reconnaissance. Spying is a different form of...

Modern archery is more complex than archery in the days of melee battles, with many kinds of bows and shooting aids, but still, in the end, it’s pretty straightforward. Picture courtesy of Pixabay. My wife, a senior citizen as you might expect, recently took up archery as a hobby! This got...