I hate everyone and everything from now on with the pure and exhausted hate of a self-employed small business owner who's filed their taxes with only 2 hours left on the clock.
I feel like screaming, throwing up, and bursting into tears. Instead I'll go calmly help get my kids to bed.
Nighty night, friends.
More like smacks day.
Ugh. Some kind of deep down, I don't understand why I can't just pick up a pencil and draw like Moebius.
Getting back onto the #ApocalypseWorld #RPG horse this evening after a few months' gap.
One of my players has been using a hybrid (hehe) playbook I put together for him, that's a cross between @lumpley's Quarantine and @wurzel's Remnant. It's slightly setting-specific, and obviously tailored somewhat to the player in question, but I still kinda like it.
If anyone's curious, here's how it works:
See, thing is, I need to be doing my taxes, not binge-designing a whole new dang game.
But guess which I'm doing.
I find when I publish a game that it doesn't seem real. Even when it's really, really real, like when there are cases of physical books in my living room and I'm putting them in envelopes myself and physically taking them by 10 and 20 to the post office, it seems imaginary somehow. Even then, like the books appear and disappear, not like I made them and they're real and I'm sending them to real people at real destinations. It's strange.
So much moreso, running a Kickstarter.
Just finished The Bloody-Handed Name of Bronze, v.2.4! PDF will be free to Patreon subscribers, of course! https://patreon.com/joshua Also finishing microshock:1 Alternator, my Altered Carbon Shock: focus micrograme! Both should be in print at PAX East this week!
HOLY CRAPS I submitted the King Is Dead Kickstarter for review.
It goes live as soon as they get back to me.
WAAAAAAAA so stressful.
The pattern you create just by choosing questions and answers becomes, as if by magic, an engaging, vulnerable, strong character with live-wire relationships and real emotional momentum. I think it's pretty cool.
Anyhow, that's it. It's an unusual little game and I'm eager to talk about how it works. Thanks for reading! (7/7)
Together, the scripted questions and unscripted answers create an effortless and newcomer-friendly kind of roleplaying.
You're never put too much on the spot. Even if you've never roleplayed before, it's easy to think, feel, and act as your character, and you end up identifying with them. (6/7)
And then the answers are constrained by the question, of course, but otherwise unscripted, and you're always allowed to elaborate.
"Oh, I give ground readily, but it's to draw you out. Soon I have you stumbling after me, off-balance, rushing forward to keep your feet under you." Or "are you kidding? I'm terrified. I give ground almost in a panic and you can drive me wherever you want." (5/7)
From Meeting Sword to Sword: "I overreach and you have the opportunity for a dirty little blow, a kick to the knee or an elbow to the ear. Do you take it?"
From Meeting Sword to Sword: "I launch a sustained attack with my weight behind it. Do you give ground readily or grudgingly?" (4/7)
From the Dance: "I lose my place in the dance. Do you let me stumble, or do you draw me back into place?"
From the Dance: "My hair has fallen in front of my ear. Do you touch my face?" (3/7)
The scripted questions are all overtures, invitations, challenges, openings for your fellow players to take you up on.
They let you choose how vulnerable you're going to make yourself, and what kind of vulnerability, and they also make sure that you're offering enough for your fellow players to respond to. (2/7)
The King Is Dead is designed for any mix of roleplayers and non-roleplayers to play. I want to talk a little about that, one of the design principles that makes it work.
The game uses scripted questions to make sure that your interactions are charged and dynamic, and unscripted answers to let you give your character voice and expression. (1/7)
Spent the morning today setting up the Kickstarter for The King Is Dead! Launching next week!
Ugh, I got deadlines, I can't be falling in no dang rabbit hole.
Overheard, my 12 year old: "ah, worlds. My favorite oysters."
Working on an app edition of The King Is Dead. https://dice.camp/media/-AqLGaF8mTIok4NM0lM
So that's fun.