Random List 'o Stuff

Here's a list of random items I keep on hand when I'm running games. The header is my design but I did not write the list. In fact, I want to know who did write the list so I can cite them. I do not remember.

Still, here's a list. Feel free to use it.

Black Pudding Video and Matt Hildebrand

Oh how much I loved this video that Matt Hildebrand put together for me when I released Black Pudding #1! Gotta dust it off every once in a while and give it a spin.

Matt is awesome. Not only is he one of the more prolific layout folks working in indie RPGs, he's a terrific artist and a genuinely great guy.

BTW, the music is by Witness the Reckoning, a band my brother-in-law was in for a number of years. They disbanded years ago. Hard! He's the one in the blue shirt with a beard.

Zkoth Campaign: Bald Mountain Baddies

Follow up on posts I made about running a public campaign at a local brewery...

We are at least 4 sessions in and the rotating cast of PCs has managed to explore the bald mountain base of a weird alien race and has had multiple encounters with their owl bear soldiers. Next session will see them locked in combat with a host of owl bear guards on their final push to overtake the entire location and secure its treasures in the name of the Jade Prince.

Next session is this Wed.

Thoughts so far on public games:

They are necessarily lite. Without a dedicated core of players and a lot of time to play, it's very hard to develop depth. But this is D&D... and for my money I'd prefer to keep it lite. We can and do develop characterization over time. Some players come almost every game and play the same PCs, so that naturally leads to character development.

It is really cool to get to play with different people. I love the folks that always show up, of course. They are the core. But when I get a random new person I don't even know it's just a cool thing. Doing this is going to challenge my DMing skills to the fullest, I believe. At least in terms of organizing and orchestrating games in general.

So far so good.

Happiness

I like cool animation. I will start sharing stuff like this on the blog here-and-there, as the mood hits me.



I ran across Steve Cutts' Happiness short and it was super cool. If you were thinking about buying that new car or going on a shopping spree maybe it's happiness you seek...

Tee Shirts and Coffee Cups Are Necessary Things

I cobbled together a little Teespring store with some goodie goodie grumdrop merch! This merch is totally going to make you look sexy as hell and all your coffee will be sweet as pie, bitter as bad butter, and loaded with gasoline.

I think I saw some sticker options on there... gonna add those later. I like sticking things on my face.

Wenching and Carousing

I was talking to my friend Jayne about a potential slutty character class they were thinking of doing. That lead us to Googling for wenches, trollops, hood rats, etc. - all within a D&D context. And of course there are results you can find on a spectrum of quality.

But during that search I found a post on A Wizard's Kiss about wenching. Color me interested.

The post offers a little bolt-on for the carousing rules from Jeff's Gameblog, which itself is a way for PCs to burn gold, earn XP, and get into trouble between adventures.

So the wenching rules add the possibility of love. Or lust, or whatever. Because in pulp stories, the hero very often ends up with a hot dish. And many of those stories are, of course, quite sexist. Or most? Anyway, the author addresses this concern pretty easily:

"Well, let's just get one thing out of the way first: much as I love it, old-school pulp fiction is kind of sexist. The protagonists are almost always men and the women are usually quite passive characters who sit around waiting to be rescued or carried off like treasure. So let's just sweep that aside and take note that from hereon in these rules the term 'wench' shall refer to NPCs of any gender and sexual orientation, so long as they are enthralled by the PCs' wealth and tales of derring-do."

So the way it works is you do the d6 carousing roll from Jeff's blog as normal, then you make a Charisma check, adding the carousing result to your Charisma. If successful, you roll on a medieval booty table to see how you scored. Madness ensues and you get more XP. Results include accidentally paying for it, getting a smokin' hot elf, or possibly twins.

Not exactly the right rules to use for a game with kids, naturally. But assuming your table is populated by adults (at least in age), this could be tons of fun.