Adept Play
Adept Play
Category: Conversations
One on one or small-group discussions, without the formal context of an interview or seminar.
-
Why things are the way they are
Mark Wallace contacted me for conversation about role-playing mechanics and emotions or the resulting content, among many other people. He’s written and published a lot about creative developments just outside or underneath the acknowledged media; see The Mark Wallace Experience for examples and enjoyment. He began the conversation with a bigger, relevant question: why role-playing…
-
Inspiration Discussion
For the last few years the topic of inspiration has increasingly become both noticeable by me and important to me. I wanted to talk about it with others. Jon and Claudio wanted to as well, so we recorded it. Note: we focus here on inspiration as the necessary first step that launches into preparation and…
-
Issues #1-7
Sam and I sat down last week to record a conversation about a 7-issue run on Villains & Vigilantes we did along with our longtime creative collaborator Robin. Personally, I value how unprogrammed this particular dialog was. We excavated lessons from our play of Villains & Vigilantes that we’re excited to apply to our current…
-
Improving as “just players”
At Sam’s suggestion, he and I recorded a conversation about improving as “just players,” not GMs. We have 2+ years of conversation, shared play, and mutual influence between us, and we were able to ground the topic firmly in our experiences of play. The conversation largely speaks for itself. However, I want to highlight a…
-
Champions Now Debrief: “Fear Death . . . Fear a Frog!”
Here’s a video debrief I did with Alan and Jon about our year-long Champions Now game, featuring middle-aged heroes in Burlington, Vermont (and a few road trips to New York along the way). Tons to discuss about situations, who can Presence attack whom, crazy mystical powers, and the simple joys of jumping around and kicking…
-
Sewer madness
Not with me, but rather it’s me interviewing Kristoffer about his alleged one-session, now multi-session game of Electric Bastionland. The context begins with a bit of prior play with me GMing, using only the free version, then the subject of this interview, which is his GMing from scratch with another group, using the entire text.…
-
A People’s History, or at least a person’s
A lot of interviews showed up recently. For this one, I was contacted by Nune, who is studying entrepeneurship in Rotterdam. (rhymes with “rune,” one syllable) His questions included what does it mean to be a role-playing publisher, what do you have to contend with, what should you consider, and especially, the term he used,…
-
Thoughts, philosophies, ideologies, and demons
About when I think it’s time to retire the old email for good, as it mostly delivers spam whose algorithm is clearly confused, someone uses it for the only reason anyone should. Ransom contacted me to ask some questions about Sorcerer which led to this conversation. They were pretty deep questions, including positions regarding the…
-
What Do I Like and Where Do I Get More of It?
For a while now, I’ve joined in a Tunnels and Trolls game run by Jon Hastings, mostly with members of his longstanding friend group. One of them, George, wanted to have a conversation with Jon about how to follow up on what interested him in his RPG experiences. I nosily asked if they would be…