We played the twenty-fifth session of our Dungeon Module B1: In Search of Unknown AD&D 2e game last night. You can read past play reports here.The roster for this session was as follows:Llombaerth, CG elf thief 4 (Adam)Mirkle, N human fighter 3 (Maya)Rhonodel, NG elf cleric 1 (Jack)Rory the Small, LN human fighter 2 (David)Zommernar, CN elf fighter 3 (Nael)Egbert, human necromancer 1 (NPC)Brazile, halfling hound master, his dog, Ripper, and the party's three war dogs, Huey, Dewey, and Phooey…

Have you ever found yourself working on a mini, and there’s something about it that just… isn’t right? Some aspect of the sculpt that just feels wrong? Last fall I had 2 minis that I felt that way about, both from Reaper’s Brinewind box. The first was the squeezebox player. Something about the head felt off. The forehead was too far back, or the face protruded too far out. It reminded me of a howler monkey. It looked better once the mini was painted, but as I was working on it, it bugged me the…

The 4K release of Aliens is a spectacular transfer. The amount of detail is an astounding demonstration of the format, and the film still stands at the pinnacle of action-meets-horror. Hard to believe it’s had 40 years of impact on the genre aesthetics, costume design, and sets. (With restraint!)

A spaceship crash landed long ago in the desert and now it is buried in sand. Only the airlock pokes out just slightly. Inside, chrome surfaces with ivory frames. The whole place is reflective and wonderful. Most doors lift vertically. Marked doors demand a check to bypass! The whole ship is dangerous. Test your CON every turn spent exploring or lose 1HP due to radiation exposure. 1 Airlock and LobbyAn airlock in the tall ceiling meant to be accessed in 0G space travel is the first obstacle on…

Segmented mini-scenarios had existed prior in role-playing games, such as a series of individual town narratives in Dragon Quest or a variety of non-linear objectives in Ultima, but SaGa presents sketches of four separate quests entirely, bound together by an anonymous central tower. A mundane start in a sword-and-sorcery setting gives way to a steamy island-hopping locale, each with a laconic cast of characters that mostly stay out of the protagonist’s way. This changes towards something more…

We love it when we find weird and unique indie games to tell you all about! Our alien friends to the left herald these occasions. Puzzle fiends will recognize this puzzle website as another implementation of Japanese puzzle magazine Nikoli’s Tentai Show, also playable as part of Simon Tathan’s Puzzle Collection. It’s a very cool implementation though, and all of its puzzles are handmade while the Collection’s puzzles are procedurally-generated. Galaxies implementation by Luke Steuber Refer to…

You know how it is. You want to run NIGHT SHIFT. Your players want to play Dungeons & Dragons. Well, my last Jackson, IL adventure shows you can do both!Hey Look, A Dungeons & Dragons Ride!This adventure idea began innocently enough back in September. It was September 17, and I noticed that it was the anniversary of the Dungeons & Dragons animated series. I didn't watch it a lot back then; I had a job on Saturdays, but when my kids were growing up, I rediscovered it. We picked up the DVD set…

I recently took part in a Pokémon Draft League with some friends and was able to take the title home, so I wanted to write a bit about the drafting process and prep that I did. For the uninitiated, a draft league involves drafting (wow, big shock) the ten Pokémon we want for our team in snake fashion, and then playing a match a week against each other — we played in the Regulation M-B VGC format (that's doubles). We had two pools of eight (I was placed in Pool B) with the top 4 from each pool…

My step-father was a USCF-rated chess master. One day, we were talking about what makes the elite of the game so good at the game – grand masters like Bobby Fischer and Anatoly Karpov – than everyone else. Him: “Well, those guys can see every possible move and every possible counter move for the whole game. So, from the very first move and every move after they can game out all the ways it can go until mate in their heads.” Me: “Wait, if they can both see the whole game and every possible move…

#bitsyjam100, the final bitsy game jam by the creator of the free bitsy game making tool, has just started and will run for the next few months. Obviously other folks will be organizing bitsy game jams after this but this is the final #bitsyjam. I will try to make a game for this one with my kids (I only participated in one bitsyjam before this a long time ago), and would like it if you (points out of the screen towards you) joined me.

I was involved with Glock’s single-stack micro-compact guns (officially called their “Slimline” series) since the day they launched the .380 G42 at SHOT Show 2014. The thing is, all the gun writers there had one thing in common when talking about it: why wasn’t it in 9mm? Glock listened, and just 16 months later, debuted the 9mm G43 at the NRA Show in Nashville in April 2015. They couldn’t even wait til the next SHOT Show to fix their mistake! Man, the G43 was something at the time. And still…

The name SeedlessDS is wonderfully literal. SapphireRhodonite already has WatermelonDS, his longer-term Nintendo DS emulator built around melonDS, so when he began working on a smaller, lighter alternative, the joke more or less wrote itself. Take the watermelon, remove the seeds, and you have SeedlessDS!The joke stuck, but the reason for the emulator existing is considerably more practical. Android retro handhelds have become faster at an astonishing pace, but not every interesting device is…

A Pokémon fan called Adam remembers his first experiences of collecting Pokémon cards during the late 90s and early 2000s

Today something different! Not a review but a note about a game i participated in. A while back I joined Eric's RPG Discord to participate in his "Once upon a game" series and managed to land a spot in a Tales of Argosa one-shot. The series is essentially a group of experienced players and GMs coming together to kick the tires on as many game-systems as possible and see what we can learn from them. See below if you are interested in watching the actual play! Skip here if you are only interested…

I just concluded a play-by-post play-through of the The Iron Coral by Chris McDowall. We played the first floor in the second edition of the rules (the first edition entailed only this first floor) and kicked things off with the players in a boat towards the iron coral. The initial setup is very flavorful and eerie and it was easy enough to draw the players into the world. The dungeon itself has a very high encounter frequency and an interesting encounter table that keeps things in motion and…

RJ-83 Crimson Firehawk Pack-in Young Jedi Adventures Vehicle Pilot Item No.: No. F7878 Manufacturer: Hasbro Number: n/a Includes: Crimson Firehawk vehicle, Nash Durango pilot figue Action Feature: n/a Retail: $44.99 Availability: August 2023 Appearances: Young Jedi Adventures Bio: Nash Durango was a female human pilot and mechanic from the Outer Rim planet Tenoo who lived during the High Republic Era. She befriended Jedi younglings Kai Brightstar, Lys Solay, and Nubs. (Stolen from…

The Wizard of Oz (1939)

I was a big fan of Sokpop's previous games - they used to release a very small game every single month. Some of them, like Stacklands, ended up becoming full-sized titles. Their output was proof, I suppose, that you can constantly make loads of games on a fast schedule without AI if you are disciplined about reusing your resources. You can see their Steam developer page here. I think playing a lot of their games in a row can teach you a ton about scoping projects and reusing stuff. It's pretty…

The Czech version of this article was published on 23rd September 2014. Somehow, I forgot (or was too lazy) to translate it. But now is the time to remediate this mistake.To conclude, here’s a strategic overview of the situation: the invading forces are clinging on for dear life in the Valley Principality, and the local inhabitants aren’t content to just stand by and watch. Above all, a local group of hunters led by Captain Halfred. The whole story unfolds behind the front line, where only the…

We're getting closer to Halloween and I hope you're enjoying these reviews from Trick or Treat Studios' Day of the Dead toyline. Today I'm checking out Dr. Tongue, the first zombie shown in the film. He's a creepy character with one of the best designs in horror. This guy might not be an iconic character but I think he's definitely a recognizable zombie. Even folks who neither know his name nor what film he's from can still recognize him based on his popularity. I've seen many masks based on…

I’m doing an Ask Me Anything on r/rpg and it is filled to the brim with discussion of the new Microscope, West Marches, and a mess of other things too. I’m Ben Robbins, the creator of Microscope and West Marches. AMA! by u/benrobbins in rpg It’s wrapping up soon but it’s not too late to get in there. If you’ve got questions about the new Microscope (or really anything else), I am contractually obligated to provide answers

On Survivor 51 episode 4, Jeff Probst declared, "Day eight, Survivor 51, a brand new start!" BUT WHY?! Things were going so well.

We doing player advice blogwagon time. But I figure I just tell you how I play, or how I try to play if the system/table lets me. How I play also informs my favorite type of game to run, which is a longterm player driven sandbox campaign. This post is just me trying to crystallize a few things that drive me as a player, and if I don't have them in some form I'll likely be bored after a few sessions. It all starts with me taking "play to find out" literally and seriously. Ok, so actually let's…

This is a story about hulking beast-men who lurk in the woods, waiting in the shadows to ravage men who stray from the path. But despite that description, this will not be erotic fiction. No, it’s about orcs and the game of cultural telephone that has resulted in divergent evolution within Japan and outside it. Depending on who’s telling the story, sometimes these monsters have a distinctly porcine appearance. Sometimes they don’t. Yes, it’s a matter of orc and pork — but again, despite how…

Jeromy Stroh, the creator behind, "Fantasy Online 2," saw my posts about other indie games I found snazzy and thought I might enjoy learning about his own game. It is a pixel-art MMORPG that takes place in a persistent World (a bit like Ultima Online, World of Warcraft, and so forth). It has a mix of adventuring, crafting, combat, and so forth. It can work within STEAM, on a PC's browser, and on a number of Android devices. No matter which format players use, they exist within the same,…

We're going live a day early with this one as I'll be at Gamehole Con through the weekend. This Month on Table 46No new posts this month! I had a bit of a health scare; hopefully I'll be able to return to normal quickly. Blog Posts and Other Gaming ReadingInside Out Library is a resource that compiles over 1.8 million illlustrations from over 50,000 books in the public domain. Theory Microblog: This Ogre is Quantum, or The Unseen - Orkish Odyssey - on semantic drift, the quantum ogre, and…

In the year 2086, Earth and the Solar system are governed by the Federation, a supra-national organisation that evolved out of the United Nations. In a world of advanced robotics, artificial superintelligence, climactic disturbances and natural disasters, it falls to the International Rescue Organisation to fly to the rescue of anyone in trouble on or off the planet.I think I can guess what you're thinking here: what the hell is Thunderbirds 2086? You've heard of Thunderbirds, the 1965 original…

Part of the lure of duplicate is everyone has the same cards. But that doesn’t make it fair. Today E-W average over 22.7 HCP (to NS’s 17.3). Thankfully I normally sit East or West. And not just the HCP but (for the most part) things were on. My partner was complaining “How can I beat the field by finding a squeeze when every finesse is on?” A typical hand. West: Axx Axxx Axx Kxx East: KQ JT KJxxx AT8x With north having QT9 of diamonds in the pocket (and clubs 3-3), slam is cold in NT and/or…

For the last three years, I've run a Planescape1 campaign through almost all of its modules. Now, after successfully finishing it, I want to look back and review these adventures, highlighting the pros and cons of each one. Each module will be rated in three categories, up to 3 points in each: Presentation: how easy it is to understand and run the adventure. Openness: how open the adventure's scope is, regarding the freedom of choice. Quality: Overall quality of the adventure, including the…