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People tend to avoid having to lose progress, so they tend to not want to die. What's even the alternative, really, presuming have a problem with TPKs? Stopping play altogether? Restarting from the beginning, undoing even more progress?

Re: TPKs I think the most straighforward solution is to just "reload" the game instead of ending it. There's no inherent virtue in always keep the narrative going in one smooth line, and people tend to already have an understanding of how it works and how to separate abstract game mechanics...

Does everything have to be a mystery? Yes, performing such a maneuver would be logistically harder. There are no win-win deals. In my opinion, the sacrifice of one specific (but interesting!) possibility is worth increased information bandwith, cutting on time for recapping and redescribing...

Yeah, I think I legitimately lost braincells reading it. There are some common design pitfalls, it's not uncommon to see mechanics that are there but do nothing, it's even more uncommon to see asinine layouting and organization of books (which are, frankly, more important factors than mechanics...

The party at large is taking a risk of having one of its members for the reward of the intel, and both the risk and the reward are present and meaningful regardless of whether characters have means of communication or not. Would scouting be meaningless if characters just had walkie-talkies or...

If you play videogames, I think there's a difference between: actively playing the game (equivalent of, well, being in the scene that is currently being played) passively watching a cutscene (not being in the scene and just watching other people play) And if a cutscene starts, and you only...

Most people do, and I think it's a big reason people at large aren't fond of splitting the party. At least to me, a longer break means that I can just disengage from the game completely, recharge and then return invigorated, but if I have to actively pay attention it's draining, and when...

I personally think splitting the party is fine but with caveats. As a player, I don't mind to just sit back and watch for a while, take time to think about what's going on, quietly chat with other players and discuss the events of the game (having a separate room is a godsend), and also go for...

I need a way to add, move and draw on top of images. That's the minimum thing, and it enables most things that are required for most games -- you can have character sheets, maps, clocks, whatever, by just having a canvas to drop stuff onto and draw on top of. Other than that, smart-ish tokens...

I've started playing RPGs again. Which means, I have thoughts. So.... I'm playing in a 50 player Grimwild campaign ran by two amazing gamemasters. I'm having so much fun it's unbelievable. Logistically, there's a groupchat with all the players, where GMs post announcements for what are...

My opinion of custom dice changed a lot. I used to hate them, now I love them. After trying more arcade games I realized how powerful custom controls, purposefully built for the specific game of the cabinet, are, and how much crazy design there is among arcade games, from rhytm games where you...

All games are about having fun. That's, like, the nature of any recreational activity.

That's a major reason why my recent designs are built around elaborate and fictionless resolution minigames where you can and should be playing to win. Because playing to win against a resisting opponent is fun, who could've thought.

Honestly, I wouldn't expect anything else. Developing games is hard! The way I see it, it's just a little fun on the side to be had.

Here's a TRPG with rules that contain the entire game There doesn't exist a single situation that isn't covered by the rules. What now?

Damn I somehow forgot how much Killer Mike is killing As of the actual question: mostly in person, online only with people I particularly like and who live far away. But if my city didn't have a cool club that is right next door to me, the answer would be very different.

GM is controlling opposition. That is, by definition, not neutral nor impartial. For obvious reasons. I honestly can't believe that I have to spell it out. You can have an impartial arbiter between two opposing teams of players, sure. Too bad there's no Team Monsters in dnd, yeah. (And even...

Sure, I think that'd be a fair assessment (which, I must say, is not a value judgment, just something I vehemently dislike) Although, say, B/X can easily be played basically like a boardgame where players basically gamble at whether the next door they'll bash will be good or not and the GM is...

I must say that while on paper the GM's decision making is unconstrained, in reality you can't really do any of those circumventing measures. Because you'd get called a jerk and the players will get one step closer to deciding that maybe just grabbing a few beers and playing cards all night...