Adept Play
The mathematics of play invokes the broadest and most interesting branches of systems theory, including sets, chaos, Boolean logic, and games. This is the topic of the course Numeracy.
We are continuing to play Proteus, as first described in Magic, mutants, rats, guns. As you may recall, after the flashback session, we are back in the present as Ramzi the newly-arrived Stygian, Rhena the Rhat, and Siobhan the mutant escort/eros-priestling are battling stinking dead dogs apparently determined to kill Master Gah, Rhena’s mentor in…
Meet Cosmarina the Space Girl, Brutalina the Barbarian Girl, and Stacey X the Alien Girl, whom I brought as these pictures and character sheets to a public-meet-the-gamers event here in town, at a center for filmmaking and viewing called Cnema. Here is what I do. First, I set out the Space Rat play-materials in an…
I’m currently 72 sessions into a D&D5e campaign I started in March of 2019. It is day 189 for the adventurers. The players are just beginning to reach level 10ish. I have a roadmap for the game out to level 20. Who knows how far we’ll make it or how long this will go on?…
Parallel to Noah’s presentation of his game in progress in Actual Play and also to his discussion with Tommi (see Characteristics vs. Skills), he and I talked about our experiences with the RuneQuest resolution methods, old and new. Briefly, and consistent with my comments at Fantasy adventure emerges, bright and harsh and The headwaters at…
I wanted to post up some probabilities for Runequest: Roleplaying in Glorantha. After I asked on Discord, Tommi generously crunched the numbers for me. You can view the spreadsheet he built (and lots of other game-related stuff) at his blog. As background, there are two methods of opposed rolls in RQG. The first is to…
Here’s a blessed event insofar as I can finally talk about role-playing content and procedures that are ordinarily kicked down the road. For me, Adept Play is a rousing success insofar as ideas can be introduced and resolved enough so that “next ideas” can actually be addressed, and I don’t have to spray down the…
Prompted by our discussions in the comments across posts here, Lorenzo Colucci brought the relevant mechanics of his game in design, Crescent (working title), for some high-focus work with me. His concern is perfectly clear: if you are playing chess, then there’s a reason why dice aren’t involved, particularly dice rolls whereby a contestant can…
The mystic world heard my cry, evidently, and has delivered a glowy burst of conversations about what dice do, especially when rolled in profusion. This time I have the pleasure of talking with Ben Milton, in an almost completely unconstructed, non-interview-like chat just because we like these dice things. Part 1 examines what big dice…