Billy Goes to Mordor

So, I've been wanting to try playing a DCC RPG Wizard for a while now. I don't usually play magic-using characters, but the colorful...

Doc Bargle recently wrote a great little post pointing out the tension between good tactical combat and good roleplaying. I recommend that ...

Well, for the second session of "Hoard of the Dragon Queen", I actually tried to figure out who the other members of the party we...

OK, let's talk about the "Bonds" provided in "Hoard of the Dragon Queen". I complained previously that giving e...

So I'm happy with how the Alternate XP System for Cyberpunk 2020 turned out. It's simple, elegant, and intuitive. I did have to put...

Improvement Points--they're such a pain! The DM has to award them. The players have to spend them. It's a lot of bookkeeping to for ...

There's nothing like the joy of when your sandbox setting starts to take shape and show a life of it's own. I've had "...

Books Good literature--it tends to be of the type that submits to deep Critical Analysis. This may be intentional on the part of the aut...

Okay, let's tackle this little topic.  I need an unarmed combat system for Kill, Cyborgs Kill! , the cyber-horror adventure I'm work...

My work has me dealing with a lot of data. Customers send us data and we use our software systems to help us analyse it. Now there are two t...

OK, following up from last post , here's another approach to playtesting that borrows from software testing. Coverage-Based Software ...

Playtesting. It's an important part of developing a game system or module. Until you playtest, everything is a priori--all your assumpti...

So I've had a lot of secondary exposure to Wargaming. When I was a kid, an older friend created a WWII boardgame for mass battles. In o...

So, after deciding to make the Cyberpunk adventure I'm writing DnD-compatible, I started thinking about how to do the skill system. PCs...

An  excellent post about putting wars in your campaign left me asking what wars I've inserted in my sandbox campaigns in the past. M...

OK, so here's the thing.  I used to be really into the question of "What rules to use?" You know: "What system to use?...

Another topic Raymond Chandler touches on in his essay  "The Simple Art of Murder" is Clues .  He points out that Hardboiled ...

Wow!  My wife actually playtested Fight Club with me!  All I had to do was convince her it isn't an RPG, just a stand-alone game(which i...