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On Extrapolation from fiction being “fundamentally arbitrary” Definitely agree here. Players do not accept an arbitrary fiction. In a rules-light system, the GM has to make sure that their fiction makes sense. In a rules heavy system the GM is absolved of that to a large extent; they can...

I’m with @pemerton here. There was a recent thread here about how to model dune-style shield combat in games. My thought (since I’m running Fate at the moment) was to make a shield an obstacle that must be overcome to harm the opponent. How do you overcome it? No set rules; it just has to make...

As a marketing term, rules light means i can read the rules in an afternoon and get my players playing it solidly within 15 minutes. That is an important descriptor. If a company described their game as light and it failed to meet those criteria, I’d trust the company less and be less likely to...

When I run in a historical setting, I set the expectations clearly. For example: This game will be set in 18th century London, and characters are expected to behave as people of that time did, with the exception of racism, misogyny and gender preference biases. Those biases and behaviors exist...

If you want to assume that all one point relationship is mild, absolutely -- go ahead, but since we were talking about RAW, the default assumption is that a one point relationship is sufficient so that: "your connection to this icon brings trouble from people associated with the heroic icons...

That may be the case, but honestly, I can’t recall any campaign I’ve been in mentioning it. I’m pretty sure it’s no more than a brief advice though; Definitely can’t think of any rules or mechanics that depend on this. I’ll look up the rules tonight! Edit: yup, it’s in the SRD even. starting...

This is one of the reasons that I like the way 13th Age replaces alignment with allegiance to Icons. Rather than a check-box saying you are "evil" you are choosing to ally with Icons who are cruel, undead, warmongers or the like. It's both softer and more actionable -- the player gets clear...

One thing to note is that the headline seems to be assuming Roll20 is the measurably which games should be evaluated as to popularity. But it makes just as much sense to reverse that outlook and rewrite it as: ------------- Roll20's Latest Usage Report: Cthulhu players leaving, D&D remains...

Well, as a real-world Christian, pretty traditional theology asserts that God’s ability to help you is limited by you yourself. For evangelicals, God will not “save you” unless you allow it, and there are numerous biblical and theological positions that say that God rewards people according to...

I think it's more a play style sort of thing. I saw the same thing in a thread on "underappreciated GM skills". Some GMs/players are very simulational in approach, and they hate any attempt to define parts of the world based on the characters in that world. So for them, they want to explain the...

So it looks like there are three camps of answers: People actually answering the question with under-appreciated skills People saying to make the player characters the focus and be a fan of them People saying to do the exact opposite of 2

Yes, totally. 13th Age has easily the best monsters that are ready to go, but 4E made customization and creation of unique, fun, tactically interesting monsters so smooth. Here's a couple of my favorites ... first, a medusa that leaps away from you and pushes you back out of range of all your...

I've played in multiple campaigns for 13th Age, 4E and 3.5, PF1, PF2, Savage Worlds, Fate and AD&D. I've also got 100+ hours of Gloomhaven under my belt, so I've feeling pretty much the target person for this question! I strongly enjoy tactical group play -- and by that I don't mean just...

I do agree with you that the GM is expected to tie together many of the AGON pieces to make things more coherent. My reading of the classic Greek mythologies indicates that there really should be quite important effects on the story based on the character's history, so I did a couple of...

I might suggest a modification of the way mad scientists are handled in the original Deadlands: Ask the player what their scholar is interested in and work with them to define an invention or discovery that they want to work towards. In a sci-fi game this might be "discover a way to allow...

I have been a GM for many years and consistently get good ratings (back when the RPGA used to give them, from cons where that occurs and from random players at cons who often ask 'are you running anything else?' and from friends who I trust to be truthful). I always, always read GM advice...

I've run them in anime games with no issues; in fact it was pretty easy to build them as an alternative form; something anime games work well for. You might also use mecha rules to build them if you find a mecha system you like. For me, the biggest issue is that of tone. Dragons are often...

Of the four big ones I've run (not mentioning names for spoilers) three definitely would have ended the world on failure. One "just" lets an evil entity free in the world with the assumption that it will keep getting worse, but not world-endingly so. I would absolutely not plan to have any...

Well, no. ”non-sequitur” means a statement that is unconnected to the previous argument. Since the previous statement was “AW doesn’t have dead ends” it directly is connected to that and it’s actually about as sequitur as you can get! If what you mean to say is that it’s not applicable — that...