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I read this, which basically says that the goal of good writing in fiction and for film/television is to make sure that the plans are never revealed. The likelihood that a plan will succeed is inversely proportional to the knowledge that the readers/audience have of it beforehand. If all of the...

Here are some slightly tongue-in-cheek resolutions for us dice-rollers. Not all of them apply to everyone here but I am sure everybody here knows at least one person who could benefit from one or more of them. I will realize that "bathing" and "deodorant" are not un-manly things but rather are...

I was reading my shiny new copy of GURPS: Tactical Shooting and I found a passage introducing a rule that I have literally been waiting to see in this game for years (for those who have the book, it's the "Close Quarters Battle" technique). It requires one to add a bonus which may or may not be...

A gem was uttered near the end of the latest episode of the Pulp Gamer podcast. "Baum didn't need to write a list of spells for the Wicked WItch of the West. If he needed her to be able to spy on Dorothy, then she could." This makes a lot of sense. I can't count the number of times that I had a...

I think the most important thing to get rid of in our games, is our chairs. This convinced me: http://geekcentricity.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/sittingiskillingyou.png Apparently it doesn't matter if you get exercise and eat right. Most of the damage that can be done to you is done while...

Folowing up on my previous posts about moments of stupidity and moments of brilliance at the table, how about the funniest things said or heard? Some gamign quotes, taken out of context, can be side-splittingly funny or deeply disturbing. Here are mine: As a player: My PC was closing in on an...

What are some of the things that you don't think of when you are generating a character or writing an adventure, but wish you had by the time you start playing or running it? For me, in characters, there isn't all that much, since I've played GURPS so much. Basically, I am used to being forced...

It just occurred to me that the most familiar monsters aren't scary anymore. Take zombies for example. How can any player who has been alive for the last 30 years since Night Of The Living Dead came out be truly shocked at the sight of a walking dead person who wants to eat him? The same thing...

I recently purchased an Android tablet and I've already seen a multitude of uses for it. Camera, tape recording and scanning apps have all come in handy. As are note taking ones. I can think of a few that really help while gaming: CamScanner. Turns your phone or tablet into a scanner. If you...

Reading this made my blood boil. I was shocked that anybody could be so cruel as to ridicule someone's "nerdy" game hobbies on a public blog, and even mention the person by name. That particular page has someone debasing the original blogger for what she is, but it shows that for all the...

I recently attended an anime con that had a gaming room. Attendance was paltry at best (they put games into a room on another floor, rather than in the main convention area), even though a local game store was basically bankrolling the whole thing; it was mostly card tournaments, something that...

Does anybody have any stats, any reliable survey data, ont he number of roleplaying gamers that are out there? All I can find is this: Something newer and less self-serving would be better.

What’s the “wing it or roll it up” threshold for NPCs? In general, there are two kinds of NPCs: those that the GM created with as much love and care as a player would give to a PC; and those that are either pulled out of a template of stock characters or are outright invented on the spot with...

I love dungeon crawls. As much as I love playing a character with a personality and hopes and dreams that are part of a living story, it's still great fun to take that character into a deep, dank, desolate place and kill lots of disgusting creatures; then take their stuff. The best pleasures in...

I listened to the latest episode of the Fear the Boot Podcast and although they talked about something entirely different for most of the episode, they started off by asking each other if they took the various gaming awards that go around in the game business seriously. They mentioned the...

Has anybody come across any really good RPGs that weren't originally written in English? I know that In Nomine and Kult both had their origins in French. What about others?

Exactly what the subject line says. :) What are the best game conventions to go to, other than the two that are the oldest and the most famous?

I hate psionics. I had exactly one psionic PC in a game that I ran a few years ago. The campaign was going so well before someone joined in who insisted on playing a blind man with a huge level of psionic ability; including the capacity to dominate the minds of others and play them like puppets...

I had so much fun reading responses to my last thread about RPG stupidity that I thought I would turn it around. :) What were your most brilliant moments ever experienced as either a player or as a GM in an RPG, either accomplished by yourself or witnessed first-hand? Here are mine: Player: A...

What is the stupidest thing that you ever did as a player and as a GM? I'll share mine. Player: My character attempted to disable a vehicle. Under the pretext of running a "security check," he looked it over in minute detail, before using a sleight of hand maneuver to slash a tire. One of the...