Start with a question. Is Fifth Edition Dungeons and Dragons as simple as possible? I think it’s simpler than both 4th and 3rd (and 3.5). Two things make it simpler, fewer options and fewer rules. The best example of fewer options is character creation. Fifth edition doesn’t have the variety of books that add more […]
Games for Robots
I’ve been doing a lot of gaming that is 5e specific the last few months. It’s been the focus of both the games I’m creating and the games I’m playing in. Now that my GenCon game is on the right track (update on playtesting at the end of this article), I thought I’d post about […]
GenCon 50 – Rescue the Love Boat – Initial Design
The event is entered in the GenCon System. What comes next. What do I have to start with: Cast of PCs – leveled up versions of last years Return to Gilligan’s Island Overall hook into the adventure (description of the event for GenCon) Overall plot (no and stop asking) Lists of options for the NPCs […]
How Do You One-Shot
My home group has a tendency to miss weeks. Honestly, we try and get together once a week, but work and family and vacations and family and probably work again make it difficult. Besides defaulting to a board game or just calling it for the night, we’ve found running a one-shot is a good alternative. […]
GenCon 50 – Planning for Games
It’s always an exciting day when I get an email from GenCon. Especially one announcing Event Submission. This year I’m cutting down on the number of events that I’m running because I’m bringing my two boys. I’m sure I’ll have another post on that later. I’ve decided to just run one scenario twice, instead of […]
Weekly GMing – Talky Sessions
What do you do if you know that the next gaming session is going to be “talky” with little to no chance for combat? For me this means two very different things in planning for the session. First, there is more opportunity for improve or different directions for the PCs to take, including that most […]
More Gaming with Kids
Surprisingly ( and wonderfully), my boys and I have kept our weekend sessions going for the past four weeks. In that time I have a few more tips and lessons learned from playing with kids. Don’t tell them I called them kids, they are 12 and almost 14 – but still kids to me. The […]
Gaming with Your Kids
I think it really started after I took Dominic (my youngest son) to see Acquisitions Incorporated in the theater. He almost immediately wanted to make a character. This got my older son Rowan interested, and now that you have two kids with a character each you have to start playing. It’s a rule of geek […]
Weekly GMing – Prepping for Con Games
I thought I would take a few minutes to talk about prepping for the initro doctors games I ran for Baldman Games at GenCon. These are the set of games I ran for new(ish) players on Sunday. The module consists of five, one to two hour adventures. Each of these “mini-adventures” consists of a very straightforward […]
Weekly GMing – Quick Prep
A missing GM. Unexpected kid|work|spouse|house|car events can cause your regularly scheduled GM to not be able to make it for a session. There are lots of options. Board game night. Cards. The dreaded just skip this session and come back next week. Or, someone can go on quick prep. Quick prep is what I call […]