So, as I look at what my Patreon is about and continue to evolve it, I realize that my original Patron Goal (what happens when I get X money or X backers) doesn't line up with my intentions for this Patreon, and doesn't line up with what all of you want. So I figured I'd ask you - what goals do you think you'd value coming into this?
2018-05-07 01:33:45 +0000 UTC View Post
Cover Art by the magnificent Worsey
We just concluded the final days of The Last Days of Solomon, and so I've been unreasonably busy with all of that. The players killed two of the three demon princes, and are in the process of escaping Solomon before the city is destroyed by the black Moat which surrounds it. Hopefully for them there's a world on the other side to escape to! Also, I'm zooming into the last few weeks of my term, which means there's a lot of schoolwork I need ...
2018-05-07 01:22:16 +0000 UTC View PostThis post is a bit self-indulgent and I'm sorry about that, but also every single one of these blog posts is self-indulgent, and I'm not sorry about that.
I saw a sentiment expressed recently, which a number of people have echoed in various spaces in my life, that worries me. Well, it doesn't worry me - it's just another preference in playstyles, just one that I find frustrating when touted as the objectively true opinion. This view is, "I don't want to...
2018-05-04 21:01:00 +0000 UTC View PostApologies for the late post - between wrapping up the first playtest of Solomon, working on the second playtest of Solomon, and the quickly-growing amount of schoolwork I need to accomplish, I've been doing my best to remember things like this. There won't be any Workbench Saturday this week - if there was, it would be more Solomon stuff (and I'll be posting that whenever I have something new and shiny to show off).
I had a meeting a couple of days ago with a very interesting member of m...
2018-04-29 14:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
Right now Abe and I are in the middle of two huge pieces of the Solomon project - our very first playtest is coming to a close within the next three weeks, and we're getting together materials for the next playtest, which we'll be releasing to people late May. I've been in a very manic state of mind, which has made it a lot easier, but it's still a monumental undertaking. Abe is creating a map and writing about all the districts, I'm providing information for each Character Card, we're both revi...
2018-04-25 21:40:20 +0000 UTC View Post
So at this moment I don't have a ton of information to reveal directly, as there's a lot of stuff we're in the process of revising for our second playtest. As we finish sections over the next few months, I'll release portions of them to show you all what's going on. My ideal is to only show you finished page spreads, mainly focusing on the rule systems we're developing. Some of the things I hope to show off include portions of character creation, actions and other faction pages. In addi...
2018-04-21 20:44:36 +0000 UTC View PostHi Everyone,
Before we begin with the article, I just wanted to say I'm so, so endlessly appreciative for all of you. You're making my world so much better, and you're making something that felt, a year ago, like it was an impossible pipe dream, might just be some kind of reality. I'm aware my content has slowed tremendously since the first few weeks - I'm burning through my backlog and I've been so caught up in Solomon that I haven't had the chance to develop new games. Tomorrow, for Workbenc...
2018-04-20 21:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
There are no stars above the city of Solomon, only a thick and hazy mist. There are no roads that lead from the city of Solomon, only a black and reflective moat guarded by a serpent larger than the Royal Palace. There are no farms in the city of Solomon, for all food is distributed by parades of ghostly spirits that march through the streets, leaving gifts at the door of each household. Even if they could cross the moat, there are no armies that will invade the city of Solomon, for th...
2018-04-17 21:00:01 +0000 UTC View PostPick whichever resonates most with you. If more than one does, let me know!
(Note "you're" in this context refers to both Abe and myself)
2018-04-17 21:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
I should just call this Tabletop Saturday because it seems like I only post old tabletop games on here. Anyway, this is a fun little game I wrote for 3 people, about being a sorcerer, a daemon, and the world that influences them. The more I think about it, the more I think I should just cut away everything that isn't just the Sorcerer and the Daemon fighting each other. That's clearly the coolest part of the game, right?
I think I wrote this at a time when I was too preoccupied with b...
2018-04-15 03:39:00 +0000 UTC View PostIt all started when I was talking to one of my friends about a role-playing game about addiction. The intention of the game, from my perspective, was to create a LARP where the players could encounter the difficulty of recovering from addiction, and learn coping tools for recovery. My friend made the very astute point that ultimately, when running a LARP like this at something like Wayfinder, it would be predominately non-addict facilitators and staff, working with predominately non-addict parti...
2018-04-13 21:00:59 +0000 UTC View Post
I just released Queer Messes, one of the LARPs I've been writing, on DriveThruRPG! It's about queer teenagers having drama. I posted an earlier version of it on here, but this is a more complete version, formatting for printing.
2018-04-09 21:58:09 +0000 UTC View Post
I love this game. It's not exactly the cleanest-looking game on paper (it needs a lot of cleaning up, refining, playtesting, etc) but it's a ton of fun to play and some of my best tabletop experiences have honestly been during character creation for this. This still isn't finished and might never be finished, but I encourage you to check it out and have fun with it. It's a very flexible tabletop RPG about being dying or up-and-coming gods on a road trip across America.
2018-04-07 21:00:01 +0000 UTC View PostI was talking on my Twitter recently about happiness in games. It brings up a question for me - how does emotion actually work in stories? Sometimes I hear people talk about how they write RPGs to inspire certain emotions in people - like "I want this game to make you feel angry!" or "I want to make you cry!" Those have always let me down - either you end up making me feel a flat, fairly uninteresting single emotion, or I don't and I'm disappointed in that manner. I'm not sold that a game should...
2018-04-06 21:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Hi, my lovely supporters!
I'm overwhelmed and deeply appreciated by the amount of support I've received on here. Every single one of you, even if you only had a dollar to spare, have made my heart warm and helped me tremendously. I want to say thanks to all of you.
I'd love your thoughts on what direction I should proceed in. I've released 5 LARPs and Tabletop Games, with a few more in my back log - and while I can keep releasing older games, I'd also like to be consta...
2018-04-01 22:51:40 +0000 UTC View Post
This is one of my favorite things I've written. I was originally unsure about sharing it on here, but I'm just so excited about it and the work I've put into it that I feel like I've got to show all of you. It's a LARP about being queer, and being a mess. Being a teenager, especially a queer teenager, means you spend a lot of time having a lot of feelings that you're not really able to articulate properly. This is a game about trying to learn how to articulate those feelings, and either succeedi...
2018-04-01 21:01:00 +0000 UTC View PostI really wasn't sure about releasing this game for people to see. I first wrote it last year, and it was my first real foray into the world of tabletop gamewriting. However, it's also a really fun and intense game that can be really emotional and involved. It's also not nearly as done as I'd like, but is absolutely finished enough to play on your own.
Promethean: The Unborn is based on the White Wolf game of a similar name. It was inspired when I was reading the rules f...
2018-03-31 21:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
Hey everyone, be sure to check out my newest blog post at the Wayfinder Experience. It's about game mechanics in LARPs, and how we use them - both at Wayfinder and in other contexts. I'd love to hear your thoughts!
2018-03-30 22:30:41 +0000 UTC View PostSo this is my very first post on Patreon, and certainly the first time I've ever used a blog in a concerted way in my entire life. I have a lot of thoughts, but I almost never write them down. I'm going to be using this space for thoughts about creating roleplaying games, and what interesting things I think can be done with that. Maybe I'll also use it for other things? We'll find out!
A big focus in my work at the current moment is the idea of secret rituals. I was in a delightful an...
2018-03-30 21:00:01 +0000 UTC View Post
So this is a small LARP I'm still not sure about. I think it would be a lot of fun, but I sorta want there to be more meat to it. It also sorta challenges what a House LARP is, because while you can definitely play this in a house, there's a greater priority of being at a party. The intention is to play this at a party you're throwing yourself where everyone is buying in, but I could absolutely imagine a bunch of people getting together and playing this at a club or something. I wanted ...
2018-03-29 21:01:00 +0000 UTC View Post
So this is one of a couple of smaller LARPs I'm writing for the House LARP anthology, about dying gods remembering their history and staring up at the stars. As mentioned, it's a pretty small LARP, but I think it's very profound and I'm going to be playing it when I get home for Spring Break. I'm going to be releasing small LARPs over the next several weeks, in various states. This one is complete, but has yet to be playtested, and I imagine when I publish it I'll be including extra content (sam...
2018-03-28 21:00:01 +0000 UTC View PostBelow is a list of what you'll be able to access if you back this Patreon. This will be constantly updated with new materials. The majority of what will be posted onto this page will be in-progress works, but I also won't share anything that isn't playable - just don't expect things to look fancy.
3 Adventure Games Written for Wayfinder - Silence Blooming, The Horned King, and Endless Lights.
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2018-03-28 19:39:16 +0000 UTC View Post
UPDATE: While discussing the project with several of my backers (shoutout to Jeremy!) I've made some significant modifications to the nature of the game, and I've included it below (under the name "3_29_18 The Rake". I think the mechanics of this are more interesting, and also makes the things you have to buy to play easier to acquire. I kept the older version attached, in case it was something that interested you.
So, JJ and I have been working on a series of House LARPs - ga...
2018-03-27 22:05:18 +0000 UTC View PostThis particular folder will be expanded as I work on and develop more Patreon-exclusive projects. In the meantime, I've chosen three Adventure Games I've written to show some of the variety of my focuses. You do not have my permission to share these documents with other people or running them outside of the Wayfinder Experience, and you should discuss with me before using them as heavy artistic inspiration.
The Horned King is a game intended for participants 8+, and is o...
2018-03-27 20:42:47 +0000 UTC View Post