by Will Hindmarch | Mar 5, 2012 | RPGs, Story
Jason Morningstar wrote this on Google Plus: Questioning assumptions: In roleplaying games, how come we only play each scene one time? Here’s what I wrote immediately after reading the question (so this is probably just a reflection of my habits and presumptions...
by Will Hindmarch | Mar 1, 2012 | Question, RPGs
This discontinuity in arguments about RPGs fascinates me: miniatures-based situations get in the way of RP and narrative, apparently, while games encouraging players to draw frequent maps and diagrams do not. What is it about molded plastic figures or the precision of...
by Will Hindmarch | Feb 17, 2012 | Design, RPGs
This post has been sitting unfinished in the drafts folder for years, waiting for a breakthrough to finish it. You are that breakthrough. You know that overused moment in film and television where someone levels a gun on someone else and issues an ultimatum? “Do...
by Will Hindmarch | Feb 11, 2012 | Creativity, Musing, Play, Question, RPGs
I’ve wanted to do this but never have. Have you done it? The idea is simple, the execution complex. For each major chapter in your RPG campaign, you use a different game to resolve the action. You hack and modify the games you want to use like crazy, some more...
by Will Hindmarch | Jan 20, 2012 | Design, Fantasy, Play, RPGs
I laid out seven cards I’d selected from Paizo’s GameMastery deck, Urban NPCs, in a row at the middle of the table, where both of my regular players could see them. Without any preview or overview, I tasked my players with answering the questions below. (I...
by Will Hindmarch | Jan 19, 2012 | Musing, RPGs
Each roleplaying game is a city. This is what I’ve been thinking about as I’ve been turning over definitions of roleplaying games and story games in my head, these past few days. RPGs and cities are two of my favorite things to read about and explore. I...
