Adept Play
Adept Play
Category: System Matters
System refers to any and all interactions which result in play, as a dynamic and changing form of fiction. These posts address its features at any scale or purpose of play.
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Designing for Misunderstandings?
I’m following up on a recent Discord conversation at Adept Play on the topic of designing RPGs in terms of experiences that the designer wants the players to have. I also want to make my concerns about this clear, as I think I haven’t articulated myself very well about this topic over the years. The…
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Emergency Room C
After some preparations discussed at the Discord (quoted below), I’ve finally run InSpectres. It was a mixed success, but I’m dying and preparing to immediately play it again — not least due to prior discussions: The course “Playing with the Pool” (which includes a section and activities regarding InSpectres) and several discussions and Actual Play…
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Workshop: No, Not Blackleaf!
Workshop #2 is now available here. If you’re a patron, be sure to check the recent Patreon post first, to get your discount code. Many thanks to the wonderful participants and all the points you raised: This space is for participants and, I hope, for people who get the recording, to continue discussing the topic.…
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I love the dice
We’re playing Sorcerer, online. Social context: I’m GMing and T, D, and P are playing sorcerers. I’ve played a good amount of 1-on-1 stuff with T, and a decent amount with T and D together. P joined us for a game of Hero’s Banner that didn’t get off the ground due to scheduling issues. My…
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Radioactive grit
This post continues from Apoc western, our EABA game begun last spring and repeatedly interrupted since then – but we continue, now with regularized schedules and increasing momentum. To review a bit, this is a bit of a retro-grim spin on the over-cartoonized “apocalypse restores the wild west” motif, set in an outlands town struggling…
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More Mustering Out Blues
“Mustering Out Blues” is an homage to classic Traveller I made by hacking the Pool, James V. West’s decades-old rules system (today we’d call it a “game engine,” I suppose). I’ve run a bunch of one-shots with it, but today I ran the second session of a campaign game, and I don’t want to brag…
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My Guy(s)
I’ve been enjoying playing multiple PCs across Champions Now, TORG, and (starting soon) Rolemaster. When I encountered this practice first-hand, it was in the GM role and in the context of ‘the crawl,’ playing Lamentations of the Flame Princess and Tunnels & Trolls. In deciding to ask each player to create 2-3 characters for these…
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Shady deeds in shadowy places
We have begun our third adventure for Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, including one half-orc cleric-assassin for the Church of the Eternal and Fundamental Ordination, one half-elf fighter-assassin for the Church of the Ineffable Disruption of All Being, one half-elf fighter-thief who moonlights for the Disruption, and two half-orc fighter-clerics for the, well, it doesn’t really…
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Egalitarian Design
It has recently occured to me that my game, In the Realm of the Nibelungs, is rather egalitarian, at least compared to other RPGs my group has played. I specifically introduced #4 to prevent discussions of tactics that (a) could get quite long and (b) were largely dominated by two players in the prior campaign.…