Category Archives: RPGs

RPGs

A “Return” To Gaming

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Last night, I re-join the group I played with in a four year AD&D [Affiliate Link] campaign, Graveyard of Empires, Wednesdays on Roll20. We transitioned to Stars Without Number [Affiliate Link], in the campaign A Plague of Angels, after the conclusion of the AD&D [Affiliate Link] campaign. I had too many life things going on and stepped away last year. I will pick up with the same character I had. I guess some other players who came and went either played him or the party used him and he leveled up. He also has a clone running around that is a level higher and with different physical stats. I look forward to getting back into the swing of things. [Companion podcast episode here.]

Sunday I resume my AD&D [Affiliate Link] campaign on Roll20 that went on hiatus 2 year ago this past December. The players are the GM and other players from the Wednesday night game. It is set in my campaign world in an area called The Broken Lands. Coincidentally, I’ve been playing in a B/X game in the official Mystara based Broken Lands setting, The Orcs of Thar [Affiliate Link] , on Mondays. I had no idea that TSR had its own setting called Broken Lands.

I’ve spent the past few days organizing the notes I have in various text files into a Wiki on CampaignWiki.org. This has made things much more organized and I am refreshed on many things.

My biggest struggle with my campaign is verifying the in game date we left off. If I made a note of it, I’m not finding it.

There will be 3 new players bringing the total players up to 7. One of the new players will have a monk, so I’m making some notes to fit him into the setting. Another has a ranger, and the third is playing a magic user subclass for which I’ve only got the basic outline and a few spells, the Vexillologist that I first posted about on my blog nearly four years ago. This will force me to finish it and refine it in play. I hope to share it.

I’ve also organized the player notes and GM notes in Roll20 with a Player’s TOC and GM TOC that I’ll discuss in my Friday Twitch stream on Roll20 For Beginners. [It’s related to my YouTube series, Roll20 For The Absolute Beginner.]

I recommend planning the TOCs to easily build them as you grow so you can make them look neat and organize information in a logical fashion to find it when you need it. My goal is to be able to play with minimal reference to physical notes & books.

One of my players wants me to stream my AD&D game to Twitch. If all the players agree, it is relatively easy to do. We use Discord for audio and I’d sign into the game as a player, or make a second acccount to sign that into and show the map, etc. I’m not sure how interesting it would be. I had planned on recording things for my own use, as I like to use it to improve my GMing.

Tonight was fun and now to wait and see what Sunday’s session brings.

I’m hoping to have something to talk about on the podcast more regularly. My time spent with a change of pace and backing off some things has been good.

I also need to get back on track with my monthly PDFs, as March’s didn’t get done, and April hasn’t been started. I foresee some changes to my Patreon when I get back on track with it.

The card game got interrupted big time with the pandemic situation. I wasn’t able to playtest the current test deck to ensure it works, as Gary Con went from live to virtual. Also I can’t get fulfillment of printing as some printers of cards are shut down due to lockdowns. I think I’ll just put it on DriveThru Cards with the free art and get the word out that way, and will do a Kickstarter for the version with the art I’m having made. I’ll revisit this and settle it once things return to a more “normal” state of commerce, etc.

RPGs

Helping Others Game Online

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I am starting a regular Twitch stream on how to do things in Roll20. I will be making things that I can later add to my Roll20 Series, Roll20 for the Absolute Beginner. The first session will be tonight, Friday, April 3, 2020 at 7:00 PM EDT (-4 UTC). So come watch and learn and ask questions. I will make a note of any questions I don’t get to for future episodes. If there is no interaction, I will work on recording information for the next few episodes of my series. Here is the companion podcast episode. [EDIT: 5 April, 2020 – New YouTube video announcing Friday night Twitch stream How to Roll20.]

I plan to do other things close to the topic of RPGs but not directly RPG related on Twitch. I encourage you to follow me on Twitch and interact.

I had wanted to start a new campaign, but I’m still not in the right head space to run a new campaign. I am geared to help others, and while running a game for others will help, I need something that is more flexible and open to doing as I have the desire. Hopefully, it helps me as much as it helps others.

Prior Efforts.

A couple of weeks ago I attempted to write a post of what I could do for this time of isolation. It was long and involved and just too much.

I enjoyed Virtual Gary Con where I played in one game, ran two games, enjoyed some seminars, and helped a few people get their games going in Roll20.

I then went into a funk that did no one any good. I have worked from home for 4 or 5 years and just finished the busy time of year at the day job. I was so looking forward to going to Gary Con and a change of environment. Not getting that much needed break didn’t help my outlook. I had to do something different.

Part of what I did was stream on Twitch the reading of Frozen Hell, a short story by John W. Campbel, Jr. It is the short story that inspired the novella Who Goes There? Filmed as The Thing From Another World in 1951 & 1982s The Thing by John Carpenter.

I read it over 3 different sessions. Sadly, the last session, for some reason, I put on my work headset, so there is no sound. I will have to re-do the last two chapters.

I also got into Minecraft. The mindless simplicity of playing in creative mode where I can make what I want when I want and not have to avoid monsters is what I needed. My initial project was making a dwarven fortress. It is far from complete. I had intended to make locations from my various RPGs and finally did that the other night. I shared pictures of the mountaintop temple location of my original map and what I made in Minecraft.

What can you do?

In my prior post that died in draft, I encouraged others to make a list of what they can do to help others. I encourage all of you to do the same.

Try to change focus from the difficulties of your particular situation to how you can help others.

If your situation is such that you can’t do much to help others, then focus on things that lift you up. Movies and shows, books & comics, art, etc. Whatever it is you do for fun and entertainment.

If you need time to immerse yourself in something to distract from your own thoughts, take it, but don’t get lost.

For me, the sun finally coming out yesterday was a major boost. So much rain and clouds felt oppressive. I hope you all get the sunshine you need.

Conclusion

I hope you are safe, sheltered, fed, and your time occupied. If you need a positive activity, come check out my Twitch streams. I’ll be glad for positive interaction with others.

RPGs

Registration Chaos For Gary Con 12

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Today, February 22, 2020, at Noon Central U.S. time, Silver Badge registration opened for Gary Con 12.

The server almost immediately had issues and no one could stay logged in. The company that runs the online even registration service, TableTop Events indicated that their Cache servers had an unanticipated issue, even though they had prepared for the load of all the badge holders signing up simultaneously.

Sadly, that effort was short-lived. A few individuals, such as myself, were able to select events into their carts and complete checkout.

Thankfully, the decision was made to allow those few who checked out to keep their registration.

Later the decision was made to keep items in the carts of those who did not complete checkout. Normally, they expire after two hours.

Direct Link to Facebook post with the link contents below plus a screenshot.

https://www.facebook.com/GaryConLLC/posts/2791721214229655

Full Text:

Greetings Seekers,

Today, TTEs server had an unprecedented error and were disabled. We suspended sales at that time to take the load off the servers while they were repaired. No tickets were able to be sold before then, to our knowledge. The president of TTE released a statement regarding the error at that time and repaired the error. We attempted to reopen, but more errors kept popping up and the servers, despite adequate load, were still not functioning.

At this time, it seems our best option is to reschedule the launch. We understand that this is incredibly inconvenient and disappointing. We don’t quite know when we will reopen, but we promise to notify you by update through TTE at least 24 hours in advance. Some attendees were able to get tickets. We are unsure whether we will reset tickets at this time, but we promise to give you notice on our decision soon.If you have further questions, please feel free to contact me. It may take me a little longer than normal to answer as I have many, many emails to sort through already, but I will personally respond to each and every email I receive.

Update @ 1:43pm: The staff has made a decision regarding tickets already sold: you will certainly get to keep those. We believe very few were actually able to accomplish this feat and it seems inequitable to take those tickets away from the lucky few. TTE normally empties carts after 2 hours, but TTE has disabled cart expiration, so events in your cart right now SHOULD stay in your cart.

Thank you,
—
Caroline Burks
Director of Guest Relations
Gary Con Gaming Convention
Caroline@garycon.com

History

Registration for Gary Con has had issues in the past. They have used TableTop Events for the past several years. This year’s issues have been the worst that I’ve seen it. The history of past issues has not helped.

When the registration failed the first time, Table Top Events shared this through the Gary Con Facebook page. Direct Link.

https://www.facebook.com/GaryConLLC/posts/2791673430901100

Full Text:

An explanation of the TTE problem today and an apology from the head of TTE, JT Smith. Thanks to JT and his crew for their quick response and resolution today.

“Tabletop.Events were prepared well in advance of the launch of Silver tickets today. We had fired up over 20 extra web application servers and nodes to the database. Unfortunately, something we could not anticipate was that our cache server was about to be overloaded. The cache server is used to maintain user login sessions. We’ve handled conventions double the size of Gary Con on it, and even Gary Con itself on it without issue in the past. We’re still trying to diagnose what went wrong there. Needless to say we have replaced it with larger servers that are 12 times the size of the current servers just to make sure that it can’t happen again.

“Even though we had done everything we thought we could do in this case, Tabletop.Events still takes full responsibility for this outage. We are sorry we caused a delay in your registration. We apologize to both Gary Con and the attendees. Moreover, as the owner of Tabletop.Events, I am also personally sorry for this mishap. We will do better.

-JT”

All Over Again

Unfortunately, the re-try at 1:00 PM Central had issues again. Thankfully, as mentioned above, those with successful completion get to keep their registration. Also those with items in their cart will keep their cart when it goes live again.

On top of issues with the hotel overbooking some rooms that lead to confusion and anger among some, this has lead to a lot of harsh criticism across social media.

My Experience

My first Gary Con was number 8, and I’ve been every year since. Registration hiccups have been minor, to me. Other things, like no alert of cancelled games, table service being slow or occasionally not happening. Overall, they have been great experiences and the minor issues are fairly easy to overlook.

Growing Pains

This year, Gary Con is the biggest ever. It has morphed from a con focused on older games and miniature war games to having a large contingent of newer D&D 5e with Adventurer’s League and official Wizards Of The Coast support. Some have called this selling out to the big money, or big names, as more D&D celebrities are attending.

D&D 5e and all the rest is not a problem in itself. The real issue is that the family is committed to keeping it in Lake Geneva, home to D&D and the original TSR. This results in the reality that there is only one location big enough to hold it, and that location has exceeded capacity to house it under one roof.

It is a huge roof with the boonies at the far end of connected structures. This year, some events are occurring on the grounds of the venue but in detached buildings that are 20 minutes by available transport away. Some comments online indicated they were not sure if there was a walking path available for that.

This year will be a real test for Gary Con. Will it be capped at a certain size? Will Gary Con really be able to stay in Lake Geneva?

I certainly hope it can stay in Lake Geneva. I really like going to Gary Con as I get to see some people I don’t see anywhere else, other than other similar cons. Sadly, there is a limit to how many cons I can attend each year.

Suggestions For Improvement

I suggest getting the word out across all social media, and not just Facebook. There are lots of people who avoid Facebook and were left in the dark on other social media until those of us on Facebook could fill them in.

Such instances of “telephone” can lead to inadvertent misinformation being introduced.

Gary Con is on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and perhaps others. I suggest coping & pasting the message from one social media to all the others so those who only follow on one get it.

Also, Table Top Events should have a way to put up a message on the website so we all see it.

I’m no expert on running a busy website, but I know there are ways to deal with this. I hope they can keep a list of the issues that occurred this time, and all prior times, and verify that all of those issues are resolved before trying again. It makes both Table Top Events and Gary Con look bad.

I’ve gone to other, smaller cons that use Table Top Events and had no issues. Table Top Events handles conventions larger than Gary Con. I am not aware of the other cons using Table Top Events having these types of issues.

KUDOS

Caroline is the Director of Guest Relations and she is the best person for that job. She remains cool under pressure and handles the chaos of stressed out gamers. We should all show our appreciation to Caroline, as she is a key member of the Gary Con team. We should all chip in and get her something nice, like a vacation in a place without internet, or at least a gift card to a business she wants to patronize.

RPGs

How To Stream With OBS

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I mentioned online that I finally figured out how to stream and that it isn’t difficult, there’s just a lot of moving parts. I had one person ask me to share what I know. You can see the companion YouTube video here.

First, let me be clear that I am not an expert and have only live streamed on Twitch a half dozen times at most, and never for more than a few minutes until today, when I streamed for an hour. I recorded three new episodes for my YouTube series, Roll20 For The Absolute Beginner.

It was not the best looking stream, nor the best sounding. Proper lighting and audio are two entirely different topics for which I am not the best example. I figured out how to make it work, I didn’t say I do it well. As with anything, practice and familiarity, plus an effort to improve will yield results.

In my experience, you want to use OBS, Open Broadcaster Software. It is open source freeware that is quite sophisticated and can handle both recording your screen, or your webcam, or both, plus the webcams of others.

I have long wanted to record games I run online. Mostly for playback to analyze my GMing or to record how I explained something because I really liked how I said it, but can’t recall the specific words from memory. But getting the audio from other players to record at a volume one can easily hear always seemed always to be missing a step.

Between a combination of a few different videos and my own trial and error, I finally hit on the right formula to record the audio of another person from an online meeting software. This also allowed me to make sense of how to get the right hardware settings on my PC and get the right results for recording a small overlay with my webcam displayed over my web browser displaying Roll20 or other browser window.

I recorded about a half dozen short videos and played them back until I got the sound right. For me, I found that using the headset speakers and microphone prevented the microphone from picking up the sound from external speakers and causing an echo. There is probably a way to do sound so that it doesn’t cause an issue between all the pieces, but this was a solo operating for me to do streaming.

The same settings that allow me to stream a browser tab will also let me stream a video game. Again, none of this is hard, it is just a matter of figuring out the right combination of hardware settings and settings in OBS to get the results you want. Once you get it working, improving the lighting and sound is the next natural progression. There is a lot of information online about those topics which are beyond the current scope.

The hardware settings are going to vary by Operating System. Windows 7 is now outdated and no longer updated by Microsoft. Windows 10 is different in how you get at the hardware than Win7. Linux may vary on the GUI controls that are available with different window managers, or the command line. MAC OS, since it is a UNIX variant, should have both a GUI and command line option for configuring sound and microphones.

Once you have the hardware defaults set correctly, you can use the settings in OBS. OBS can rely on the default speakers and microphone, or you can specify the exact one of each you wish to use.

One can live stream a game or other activity to Twitch, YouTube, or other streaming service.

One can also use it to simultaneously record for editing and uploading to YouTube or other VOD (Video On Demand) service.

Obviously, this means that one can also either stream and not record it, or record it and not live stream it.

If you want to live stream an RPG, I recommend the three videos that Jacob Noorman of the Mini Terrain Domain YouTube channel put together.

Zoom is an online conferencing service that has a free option that is unlimited for 2 people and limited to 40 minutes for 3 to 100 people. There are two tiers of paid service that allow hours of use. Only one person, the host, needs a paid account. One could just as easily use Skype or other similar service.

How to Stream D&D and Other RPGs using OBS & Zoom
https://youtu.be/AvmdQaToSZw

How to Make Overlays and Stream Assets (Part 1)
https://youtu.be/3EAKW1lfucE

How to Make Overlays and Stream Assets (Part 2)
https://youtu.be/xN6YDCsfDTU

RPGs

Professional Online RPG Technology Training

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I may not be the first person others have paid to train them how to use technology to allow them to play RPGs online, but it is a new concept and experience for me. [Listen to the companion Podcast here.]

The other day, I got an email out of the blue asking if I’d be interested in training someone how to use Roll20, and he was willing to pay me for it.

I was a bit shocked. I tried googling the name to see if it was a prank or something to be taken seriously. I couldn’t find any obvious prank or troll, so I replied asking all kinds of questions. Why me? What exactly do you want to know? Do you know how to play D&D already? and so forth. We had an exchange of questions, I proposed a fee, he agreed and we scheduled some time.

He had seen my YT series, Roll20 For the Absolute Beginner, and he wanted someone to get him started running a game for his group, as they are all interested, but none of them have experience in using Roll20. He thought, “Why not see if I can find someone and pay for training.”

He said I was the first person he asked. I found that very flattering.

Friday night we had our first two hour session. Creating a sample game and going over settings and the basics. There are a lot of little things that are hard to recall wihtout using them. So I suggested he just play around with what I’ve showed him so far, and that will help him become familiar with it.

We’ll do another session in a couple days, and maybe a follow up session later, if needed.

I’ve known about professional GMs for a few yeas, but this seems like something that might pan out for players who are not tech savvy who want to use technology to play D&D and other RPGs. There’s lots of different programs for different things, and some people want the answers of how to get started in a format they can absorb and put to use without having to wade through manuals, etc.

As someone who currently plays mostly online, excpet for cons, I love RPGs and if I can help people get over the hump of using a program to help them enjoy their favorite RPG with their friends, I’m glad to help. My YT series, Roll20 For the Absolute Beginner, is very popular and gets hundreds of views a month. I can go much more in-depth one on one than I can in a video that is best kept to 15 or at most 20 minutes.

Peronally, I don’t think it’s hard, but I love technology and have been using internet technology for over 20 years and using Roll20 for 6 years. I’m a dig in a figure it out kind of person. It’s why I’m so good at my day job. As with anything, once you know the answer, it’s easy.

Our first session went well, and he asked for another session, so I think I did well. I was up front about the features I’m not familiar with, like some brand new features, but mostly the paid features, as I still have a free account. So I’ve got some homework to do to help explain some paid features. I’ll probably get a paid account so I can use them and not just rely on the online documentation.

If this ends well, then I may make myself available on a regular basis for paid training. That’s not the way I thought I’d get fame and fortune in RPGs, but teaching how to use the tools is analogous to the merchants in the gold rush. There are lots of people of all ages who are not tech savvy or with the patience to figure it out, or want to start playing right away. Not everyone can luck into a group with a knowledgeable and helpful person to show them the ropes with Roll20.

RPGs

Happy 45th Anniversary D&D

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I got very serious about blogging in 2014 when Jon Peterson posted that January is the month D&D was published. There is no precision on the dates, as he once again makes clear in his own 45th Anniversary post.

Back in 2014, I participated in the D&D 40th Anniversary Blogging Challenge, which I wrote about here. This link is a tag to that topic. I also did a YouTube video series going over each topic from the challenge, which I mentioned here.

This makes 2020 the 43rd anniversary of Holmes Blue Box, which TSR still has not released the PDF. You can get a cool 5e conversion of the dungeon, The Tower of Zenopus used as an example of play. It is called The Ruined Tower of Zenopus [Affiliate Link] done by Zak Howard of the blog Zenopus Archives over on GM’s Guild.

Since I started with Holmes Blue Box, this summer, will be my 43rd anniversary of playing D&D. See the links above if you want to read or hear the video series of my start with D&D.

You can listen to the companion Podcast episode here.

RPGs

2019 – Year In Review

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Since we’re about out of year, I decided to hurry up and put together my post for my year in review. I’ll be comparing to 2018, which you can see here.

You can listen here to my 2019 in Review and 2020 & Beyond Podcast. It’s got a slightly different focus than this post.

Conventions

I didn’t do as much playing or running RPGs or playing any games as I had hoped. While I did attend Gary Con, Marmalade Dog, Grand Con, and UCON, I had a larger challenge than normal getting in the mood to plan and run games. I did manage to submit games to run for the usual conventions I attend, Gary Con, Marmalade Dog, and UCon. As always, it went well and both I and the players had fun.

I also participated in Procrasticon I. A bunch of Anchor podcasters threw together an impromptu 24 hour online con. I signed up to run a game, but no one signed up. I played in a couple of games and had a blast. One is the Monday night game I play in now.

Barrowmaze using Delving Deeper was an online game I played several sessions. My first character, a fighter, died, carried off and eaten by ghouls. My current character is a 4th level cleric. We’re on hiatus til spring.

B/X in the Broken Lands with the Orcs of Thar Mystara supplements. I play a 4th level hobgoblin Monday nights.

Playing & Running RPGs

It wasn’t until the middle of September that I managed to get the bug to create a new campaign that I actually ran an online game. I settled on Delving Deeper, and created a campaign that I called Delvers’ Deep. The name Delvers’ Deep comes from the only thing I ever submitted to the One Page Dungeon Contest, The Dire Druids of Delvers’ Deep. I’ve run that at a few conventions. Only the name so far, exists in the campaign world. I ran it as a drop-in/drop-out game, sort of a modified West Marches. After 9 sessions players were unable to commit and then my work got busy.

Sadly, the amount of work for the day job has gone off the charts. I ended up cancelling games, and finally putting my campaign on hold until things return to “normal”. I’ve used up so much of my creativity that I also broke the pace of my regular podcast. I went from 3 episodes a week to none. I went over a month without a podcast until I had an episode on December 6th. This has also affected the frequency of blog posts and my drive to work on my monthly PDFs.

Card Game

I’ve had a hard time motivating myself to do some more hard work on the card game. Playtests have been very informative, but I haven’t done as many as I wanted. I have added some detailed notes for some additional rules based on feedback from the last few playtests. I need to build test deck 3. The amount of work that is is a mountain, that I have yet to climb. I can do it in a long day. I had hoped to have it in my hands by now. I really want it in time for Gary Con.

What about the Kickstarter? I’m really torn about this. I don’t have the new art as fast as I want. I’m also burnt out with Kickstarter, and get the impression many are. That is in addition to the way Kickstarter treats it’s workers. Also the Kickstarter user interface is very crude. I built a dummy campaign to figure out how to do what I want, and it is not easy. Part of me wants to just put the game out on Game Crafter, which is very easy. But I want to make it easily available worldwide. So I’m also considering DriveThru Cards. I need to order a deck from there to see what sort of quality it has.

Part of me just wants it done. I’m sure many other creatives hit that same wall. I just need to persevere and do the best job I can to make the rules and the cards work. I had an idea for a Halloween themed deck of cards about 6 weeks before Halloween. I’ll see about maybe doing it for 2020, if everything comes together for the game.

Publishing

This time last year, I had 5 PDFs on DriveThruRPG. Currently I have 17 since I have yet to complete the PDF for December. I will finish up my December PDF and publish it before the end of the year. This will give me my first calendar year of publishing and sales.

I now have 2 Copper Best Sellers and 2 Silver Best Sellers on DriveThru RPG. My first PDF, Locks, Vaults, and Hiding Places [Affilate Link] is only 19 paid sales away from Silver. My first Copper and then first Silver, Caravans & Trade [Affilate Link] , is 77 paid sales away from Electrum.

You can check out my full list of titles at my DriveThru RPG Publisher Page. [Affilate Link]

By The Numbers

Publishing:

  • All Time Grand Totals: 6389 total downloads for 678 paid sales $840.85 $588.60
  • 2019 Grand Totals: 5171 total downloads for 471 paid sales $585.77 $410.04 (All included in the numbers above.)
  • T-Shirts on TeeSpring – Still 0 sales beyond what I’ve bought for friends and family.

As a DriveThruRPG Affiliate, I’ve made $113.56, all but the last $25.00 spent on new purchases. Just waiting to spend it on another game or supplement.

On Patreon, I have 5 followers, up from 3 last year. I had 6 at one point, and would have 7 had 2 not had to drop off. $137.00 before fees. I’ve seen none of it since my personal and business accounts linked, it minimizes how much I pay each month for all the other Patreons I back. I really appreciate my patrons and their feedback and encouragement.

A few months ago, I decided to enable ads on my podcast. I have yet to go through the back catalog and insert a spot for ads. I’ve made a whopping $14.67.

Amazon Affiliate. I’m an Amazon Affiliate, but have yet to have anyone buy anything. They give you 180 days for a qualified purchase or they drop you. This is my second go around at this. I don’t expect to get rich, but would love for enough to negate my expenses for web space, domain name, art, etc. I’ve got 12 years give or take before I retire, and I need to achieve at least a net 0 expenses to maintain all the things I hope to be doing when I can give up my day job. Here’s a link to games. I’d greatly appreciate anyone using this link as it helps me out without any expense to you.

Here’s one for Dungeon Crawl Classics. [Affiliate Link]

[^ Affiliate Link ^]

So I’ve made $1,106.08 before fees, leaving $849.98. That does not cover the expenses it took to earn it and I waited to collect the publishing payout for 2018 until 2019 for tax purposes. It’s pennies per hour for all the effort and still less than the net of one regular paycheck. This should illustrate why it is so difficult to make money online, even just a little extra.

YouTube – 474 subscribers up 240 from last year, 71 videos up 7 from last year. With over 40,000 lifetime views. My series Roll20 For The Absolute Beginner is the most popular. I started a new series in 2019 – How To AD&D 1e. I plan to keep adding to each series. Over 425 subscribers to go until I can think about ads, since one of the criteria is a minimum 1,000 subscribers.

Twitter – 1092 followers up 372 from last year.

FB – 143 Likes up 79 from last year and 145 Followers up 80 from last year.

Reddit – Karma of 480 up 408 from last year.

Instagram – I started Instagram on June 26, 2018, but didn’t mention it in last year’s post. I ended 2018 with 67 followers and am up to 128 followers.

Blog posts 52 published posts, down 69 from last year, and 2 new drafts, down 4 from last year for a total of 25 drafts.

Total blog posts 797 counting this one you’re reading.

Podcasting

I have 11,886 total plays among my 170 episodes, for an average of 69.9 listeners per episode. 6 episodes are over 100 listeners. My first episode is at 150 listeners. I plan to do a year end podcast so the final 2019 numbers will change.

Last year’s hiatus due to work and family drama saw my podcast’s trend for growth smacked down. The proliferation of new RPG podcasters on Anchor has made it easier to get lost in the noise. No one has time to listen to all of them consistently.

I wonder how much longer I’ll maintain the effort.

Kickstarters I’ve Backed

I still backed way too many Kickstarters in 2019. 5 that should have delievered in 2018 arrived in 2019. Of 10 Kickstarters that should have delivered in 2019 that did deliver in 2019, 1 was early, 1 was on time, and 8 were late. This is the source of my disillusionment with Kickstarter. I want it when they say they’ll deliver, not months or years later. I go in for Kickstarters that I’ve never used or read the game. I know I’m not alone in this.

12 more Kickstarters are supposed to deliver in 2019, and only 2 of those appear on track to meet that goal or only be a couple weeks late.

I have 19 overdue Kickstarters. I hate to think how much money that is. I have not updated my page here on the blog where I track the Kickstarters I’ve backed. I want to help my friends with their projects, but when so many of them are late. Some do a great job of explaining things and are late for good reason, and do a great job of making sure things go at ASAP. Others do a terrible job of communicating and are late and when they do communicate, it is sometimes more frustrating than silence. I’ve learned which publishers/creators I’ve backed that I’ll never back again because of how late they were.

My Tips For Those Running Kickstarters:

I’ve backed 77 Kickstarters that funded, and only 3 that did not. So my track record of picking the ones that will fund is very good. As for picking those that deliver on time, not so much.

  • If you’re always 6 months late on delivery of a Kickstarter, add 6 months to the delivery date of future Kickstarters.
  • If you’re not good at communicating and keeping backers informed. Don’t launch a Kickstarter. If you do a Kickstarter anyway, suck it up and communicate.
  • Don’t wait to deliver bad news.
  • Do the work BEFORE you click Launch!
  • Pay the artists, layout and others as soon as you have agreed to/when the money arrives.
  • When the money arrives, pay all the bills/vendors to minimize the tax burden.
  • Get along with your team until delivery is complete. Don’t have interpersonal, legal, whatever nonsense. Get it done. Be Professional.
  • Minimize the points where things can go wrong.

Final Thoughts on 2019

I didn’t meet all my goals. That’s a realistic occurrence. However, I did well on the goals I met. I’m still here and I’m not quitting. The nature of my day job with it’s busiest time of year in December and more so in January forces me to pull back from spending time on my hobbies.

I’m also working on a review of the stats of the blog, such as the most popular topics in 2019. That will be another blog post that will take a bit to pull together.

One of the coolest RPG things I ever did was participating as a player and DM for the first ever livecast of a D&D game (5e) from Gary Gygax’s old house to benefit Extra Life. Having a video of all four games allows me to relive it a bit. Seeing how I run a game is also a helpful teaching tool to help me get better.

What’s Ahead in 2020

  • Release my card game whether through Kickstarter or directly via Game Crafter or DriveThruCards.
  • Continue one PDF a month for my Patreon that is also released on DriveThruRPG.
  • Evaluate my podcast and determine if it is worth my time to resume when work slows down.
  • Attend conventions and run and play games.
  • More regular blog posting.
    • I’d like to read more blogs like I indicated at last years round up post, but I didn’t do very well.
  • More videos on YouTube.
  • Run and play more games in person and/or online.
  • I’ve been invited back to the next round of live cast RPGs from Gary’s old house, so I’m letting ideas tumble in the back of my mind.

2019 was overall a great year. I let my thoughts and self-judgement get in the way of enjoying it as much as I should have. The older I get, the more I realize, no one else will ensure I have fun. It’s up to me.

For 2020 Gary Con, I’ll bring my card game for pick up games, and bring some stuff to run or play pick up games. I will focus on playing some wargames and a few other things. I don’t want to pack my schedule, as I want to enjoy things as much as I can with the con more crowded than prior years.

As with last year, I look forward to the changes and opportunities that lie ahead in 2020. I hope it is a great year of growth and opportunity fulfilled for all of you. May you play often, roll well, grow rich and powerful, and save or destroy the world as is your wont.

RPGs

IP, The OGL, & Game Publishing

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PREFACE

IANAL – I Am NOT A Lawyer. This means do your own research and consult your own attorney(s). This is my notes on the topic that I thought others would find helpful. I welcome constructive criticism. That is, if you tell me I am wrong, please give a source citation, with a link to this information. NOTE: I am a citizen and resident of the USA, so the following primarily concerns U.S. Law. Those in other countries will need to research the rules for your country.

I had to do research for releasing my own PDFs on DriveThruRPG [Affiliate Link] and for figuring out what I needed to do for eventually publishing my card game. (You can sign up for the Kickstarter announcement email list here. It will only alert to the Kickstarter launch.)

RECOMMENDATIONS

I suggest you check out the following two resources:

Matt Finch’s YT Playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLptTCxApuRIgObYc2zwMqwLa5WNFJl224

Frylocks Copyright of Statblocks Series:
Part 1: Copyrightability of #RPG Stat Blocks #DnD #copyright #iplaw
https://gsllc.wordpress.com/2019/08/12/part1statblocks/

Part 2: Copyrightability of #RPG Abilities and Spells #DnD #copyright #iplaw
https://gsllc.wordpress.com/2019/08/19/part2abilitiesspells/

Part 3: The Damage Done by the Otherwise Ineffectual Open Gaming License #DnD #copyright #iplaw #ogl
https://gsllc.wordpress.com/2019/08/26/part3ogl/

Part 3.5: A Mild Retraction That Makes Matters Worse for #WotC #DnD #copyright #iplaw #ogl
https://gsllc.wordpress.com/2019/08/28/part35retraction/

Part 4: FAQ/FRI #DnD #copyright #iplaw #ogl
https://gsllc.wordpress.com/2019/09/02/part-4-faq-fri-dnd-copyright-iplaw-ogl/

3 parts of IP (Intellectual Property)

It is very important to understand the differences between these three things as they are often confused, especially when they are all discussed in the same article.

  • Patent
  • Trademark
  • Copyright

PATENT:

Expires in 14 years for a design patent and 20 years for a utility patent . Can only be renewed by an act of Congress in the U.S. Apply for them here. There is a fee that varies on the exact type of patent.

Game mechanics are extremely hard to Patent.

WOTC had a patent on “Tapping A Card” for Magic The Gathering, which is now expired.

A patent application is very complex. I would not attempt one without a lawyer.

TRADEMARK:

In addition to Federal trademarks, which you can apply for here, each of the 50 states have their own trademark laws. There is a fee to register and depending on specifics Federal Trademarks are renewed every 5 or 10 years. A defacto trademark exists without registering it, but someone else can then register for a trademark and most likely own the trademark. Thus a registered trademark (R) or ® offers more protection than an unregistered trademark ™. This is so complex, you definitely want a lawyer’s help.

An example of trademarks are company names and names of products. For example, Wizards of the Coast (WOTC) and Dungeons & Dragons. Variations of the names may also be copyrighted, such as WOTC and D&D.

If a trademark is not renewed, then others may claim it. For example, WOTC let the trademark for TSR lapse. TSR was the company that released the original D&D and variants prior to being acquired by WOTC. Since the trademark to the name of the historic company was not renewed, a new company registered that trademark, so there is a living company, TSR, that published the former Gygax Magazine, has a podcast network, and a blog. [I write for Multiverse.world.]

Game trademarks have expired and been claimed by others. For example, Top Secret. The new TSR has a new version of Top Secret by the original author, Merle Rasmussen. NOTE: that while the trademark allows use of the name of the original game, the copyright for Top Secret‘s original rules is still held by WOTC.

In the case of some games, WOTC let the trademark lapse and allowed the original authors to reclaim their rights to the copyright. Examples are Metamorphosis Alpha [Affiliate Link], which is why Jim Ward can have multiple companies with various Kickstarters, and why the format of the original rules with the name of Jim’s company is available on DTRPG.

Rick Krebs, the original author of Gangbusters recovered his rights to the name, but WOTC must retain rights to the copyright of the original rules, or Mr. Krebs did not re-release them. Mark Hunt acquired the trademark to Gangbusters [Affiliate Link] and a license from Rick Krebs to re-do Gangbusters.

COPYRIGHT:

The words one publishes, such as books. It is a limited monopoly to exploit all the rights to an individual work. Current copyright law does not require official registration for a copyright to be in effect. As long as one adds (c) or © and the year, in the U.S. it is copyrighted. NOTE: Registering a copyright has a small fee and gives the owner more easily defensible rights. I have not yet registered a copyright, but as I understand it, the process is easy enough that most are able to do it without a lawyer. Obviously, if you can’t make sense of the forms, hire an attorney.

PUBLIC DOMAIN:

When a copyright expires the work enters the Public Domain. This means that anyone can publish the work and charge for it, or even modify it enough to make a new work that can then be copyrighted. NOTE: This does NOT extend to TRADEMARKS. That is, a book in the public domain published by a company that still exists means you can’t publish under the name of that company without violation their trademark.

An author may wave all their rights and release a work directly to the public domain. If this is done, there is nothing the original author can do to enforce what others do with it.

Currently, in the U.S., any work published in 1923 or earlier is definitely in the Public Domain. Every January 1st, increment the year by 1. So on January 1, 2020, all works published in 1924 are add to the list of works definitely in the public domain.

Any work not renewed after 1923 and before 1963 is in the public domain, but one must verify that it was not renewed. It is easy to verify if a work was renewed, but proving the negative is difficult. The New York Public Library has a project to digitize all the volumes from the Library of Congress, which is in charge of copyrights. It is only up to 1952, so the last 10 years of the period are not yet digitized. Works after published on or after January 1, 1978 no longer have to renew and are good for 75 years. Books already renewed before that date will expire 75 years after original publication.

Images of all the copyright renewals from the Library of Congress for each year through the 1970s are available on The Internet Archive here -> Catalog of Copyright Entries.

Once you verify a work is in the Public Domain, you are free to use it. NOTE: Works out of copyright in the U.S. may still be under copyright in other countries, so it may not have blanket worldwide public domain. So it is important to do your research.

Fair Use:

Fair use is part of U.S. copyright law that allows users to use limited parts of copyrighted works without seeking permission.

Notwithstanding the provisions of sections 17 U.S.C. § 106 and 17 U.S.C. § 106A, the fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include:[6]

  1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
  2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
  3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
  4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_use#U.S._fair_use_factors

Licensing:

Copyright is a blanket, all rights reserved. A short list of some of those rights are: use, re-use, copying, movie rights, book rights, re-print rights, etc. Each of those rights can be licensed for a term or sold outright. For example, some authors sell the movie rights outright if they don’t think a movie will ever be made. Others, like the Tolkien estate license for a limited term the movie rights and rake in the big bucks.

Licensing in the form of the OGL from WOTC and other similar licenses from other publishers were influenced by the GPL (GNU Public License) from the FOSS (Free and Open Source Software) movement. Version 1 of the GPL was released in 1989.

The OGL was released in 2000 as a way to allow and encourage third party publishers to create content for D&D 3e. Matt Finch used it to help develop OSRIC as a clone of AD&D [Affiliate Link] since one can’t mention the name of the game it clones, etc. Matt Finch also used the OGL to develop Swords & Wizardry [Affiliate Link] in all it’s flavors. The official OGL in RTF format is here.

NOTE: D&D 4e is NOT under the OGL, but D&D 5e is.

The Open Gaming Foundation is a non-profit that provides information and links to various open source game licenses. They have a page with the OGL.

In 2001, the Creative Commons License, also inspired by the GPL, was released. The CCL website explains the different forms of the Creative Commons and what rights a creator is retaining while allowing some form of copying. Some forms of this license allows non-commercial copying, i.e. for personal use, and even sharing with attribution. Other forms allow commercial use.

I have not done an analysis, so I am not sure if any of the Creative Commons licenses could be used with the OGL. The OGL probably prohibits it. In general, one license should be more than enough in my opinion. NOTE: One can use artwork in an OGL work where the artwork is under a Creative Commons license. I have done this with multiple PDFs.

A license is only needed if you want to give up some of your universal rights under copyright, while retaining a degree of control. As always, if you are not clear on how to apply a license to your work before publishing, consult an attorney. It’s easier to get it right the first time, because if you do it wrong, you may not have a second chance.

OGL

I recommend you refer to the links in the PREFACE above and watch Matt Finch’s You Tube playlist about the OGL and read Frylock’s blog posts about the OGL and copyrights in relation to games.

It is critical to copy the OGL EXACTLY and indicate the information you are NOT releasing to the OGL to preserve your rights. This is critical for text, art, and other ideas. It is easy to accidentally give away rights you want to retain. Once released under the OGL you can’t take it back. I think you can revise and re-release your own work without the OGL, but anything already released is fair game for any other publisher to use.

The OGL is basically a promise by WOTC not to sue over the parts of a game that fall outside of copyright. You can make a clone of D&D without the OGL, since game mechanic can’t be copyrighted. As long as you avoid trademarked terms and use your own words for explaining the rules, you can do it. Just don’t mention D&D. I will remind you, IANAL and do your own research before jumping in.

ART & ARTISTS

It’s unfortunate that I need to say this, but credit your art/artist and pay for art. Unless it is art in the public domain or released under a license that permits commercial use without attribution, you must give attribution. I suggest always giving attribution to CYA.

Don’t offer to pay an artist with exposure. That’s not how it works. Exposure is a bonus of a product well done and advertised well.

Don’t try to get art with payment after the Kickstarter or sales roll in. If you can’t afford to pay in full and the artist won’t work on a part now, part later arrangement, either wait until you have the money, or find another solution. There are plenty of public domain art resources online. Pixabay and Unsplash are two great examples of free art, mostly photos released in the Public Domain. The background image I found on Pixabay.

If you use art without permission, you are not a nice person. The artist has copyright to their art just like you will have copyright to your words. Don’t expect things to go well if you treat an artist other than you expect your copyrighted work to be treated.

FORMING A COMPANY

Related to IP and doing the work of creating games, is forming a company. For example, an LLC is one of the simplest and it separates one’s personal property from that of the business and affords legal protections. If one is sued personally, the assets of the business are unaffected. I used the online resource Legal Zoom to form my LLC, as I anticipated launching my card game much sooner. It involves getting a Federal TaxID Number or FEIN, and registering as a business with the state. In some states, one also has to license a business with their municipality.

The Tax ID number will expire according to IRS rules if it is not used on a Federal Tax return 5 years in a row.

The state registration requires annual renewal with a small fee in most if not all states. Sales tax withholding and reporting will be required if you handle sales directly, such as using a sales portal on your own website. Sales through a third party site, like DriveThru RPG collect the sales tax and pay you a royalty, so your only concern is if the royalty is within the parameters requiring you to report it on your tax return.

Municipalities with a business license ordinance are renewed annually for a small fee. If no business is conducted on premises, you may not need a business license. Check with your municipality.

See a tax preparer or tax attorney if you don’t want to figure out preparing business taxes. They are basically self employment taxes. You pay both the employee and employer share of Social Security and Medicare, and then the Federal, State (if any), and local (if any) income taxes. Withholding should be sent in quarterly, or you can send it in as a lump sum when you file your taxes. Plan on setting aside 30% as a general rule of thumb. NOTE: Qualified business expenses reduce the tax burden. Most tax programs, I prefer Tax Act, can easily handle the Schedule C and other forms that may be needed for filing self-employment taxes. I recommend Tax Act over any other company like H&R Block or Intuit/Quicken’s program. It is cheaper and personal experience makes me avoid the other two.

I had a job 20+ years ago that was considered self-employed, so I figured this out in the days before tax programs were as ubiquitous as today. I prefer a program as I can pull in the information from last year that didn’t change and just enter the information off my W-4 and any 1099s I get.

CONCLUSION

I have covered a lot of material above. My intent it to clarify things. These are complex topics due to the nature of laws and their minutia.

As long as you know the difference between a patent, a trademark, and a copyright and when you need each one, you should be good. In general, 99.99% of game developers won’t ever need a patent. Unless you have an idea that will be as big as Magic The Gathering with new ideas for game mechanics, you won’t need one.

For trademarks, you might not need one for your company, but you may want one for your game’s name since you can’t copyright a name. You don’t need a formally registered copyright if you use the copyright symbol and the year of publication.

The big thing to remember is that you can’t copyright the mechanics of a game, only the words used to explain it. this means that anyone can copy any game if they use their own name for the game and unique terms and their own words to express the rules.

Licenses are something you need to understand, since if you use something that falls under a license, you need to adhere to the terms of that license yourself.

Art is at the very heart of RPGs and other games. Artists deserve a fair deal. I only mention it as it is an integral part of RPGs and too many artists get too many amateurs asking for free art, or art with no upfront payment, or exposure. That’s not the way a serious publisher, whether an amateur or a multi-person company does business.

One does not need to form a formal company to do self-publishing of games, but if you expect or hope to make enough money that you want to protect the business from any issues in your personal life, it is well worth it to form an LLC.

As with each of these items, if you can’t make sense of it, please contact an attorney. I am not an attorney, so don’t trust anything I have said. Check the links I have and do your own research.

RPGs

UCon 2019 Post-Con Post

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UCon 2019 ended on Sunday, November 24 and I am finally writing about what happened. I mentioned what was on my schedule in my last post.

Pick Up Games

Brendan LaSalle, Clayton Williams, Laura Pirkola

I met up with friends Thursday night and we had a pick up game of my card game. Laura Pirkola and Clayton Williams invited me to join in a pick up DCC [Affiliate Link] game with Brendan LaSalle. It had a hard start time so we didn’t get through the full card game as we had many interruptions. The most important of which was ordering a pizza. This was critical as I got so busy with packing and so forth before the two hour drive, that I didn’t have lunch.

Brendan describing the situation.

The DCC scenario was play testing something that should be appearing as a new module sometime in the future. I don’t recall if there was a specific time frame or not. We ended up playing two characters each, until we were joined by another husband and wife who joined in at the halfway point. It was a great time, as always with Brendan.

I stayed up way too late visiting with friends in the lounge. I didn’t get to my room until 2:30 AM, and took forever to fall asleep. Then I kept waking up. Part of the issue was being dehydrated as I hadn’t had enough water during the day, then had a tall glass in the bar, after a short glass during DCC and pizza.

Hommlet

My copy of Village of Hommlet

I slept as long as I could before going down for breakfast before my morning game, where I ran Village of Hommlet [Affiliate Link]. I realized I had forgotten to grab my 1e DM screen when I packed up all my table copies of the Player’s Handbook. It seems I no longer had the PDF of the DMG [Affiliate Link] on my Dropbox nor my I got on my Google Drive. So I got on my DriveThruRPG account, since I purchased the PDF, I can just download it again…. NOT.

For some reason, I could not find it in my library. Next, I tried pulling up the PDF on its listing. Turns out I found a bug in the mobile site. On the desktop version of the website, you can click on the product listing for something you’ve already purchased, and it gives a link labeled, “Click to get it.” I got on Discord and mentioned it to the DriveThruDiscord and they said to report the issue, it’s probably a bug. [Which reminds me, I need to report it if it is still an issue after I finish this post.]

I only needed it for the combat charts. I then looked up the Target 20 System mechanic. When we were at the table, one of the players had the DMG on their tablet, so I used that to track combat, turning undead, etc. I planned on 8 players, but one person really wanted in, so we squeezed in nine players plus me around the table.

My PHB I got for Christmas the year it was released.

All of my other preparations were in place. I had five table copies of the Players Handbook [Affiliate Link] for players, plus my copy. I had them all sign my copy. This is the original, well-worn copy I got for Christmas back in the day. I’ve also gotten it signed by several TSR notables from back in the day. Sadly, not Gary or Dave.

Players in the Hommlet game.

I also have 18 AD&D Characters I created. I have form-fillable PDF character sheets for each one, and I update their information for each level. So I always have a stock of characters for whatever AD&D adventure I run at a con.

The players had a great time. I started them at the gate house instead of making them start at the edge of town and figure out where to go. Most of my rolls were in the party’s favor. Things such as surprise, finding secret doors, etc. While they did not manage to find the big bad and his minions, they did find the ghouls and it was a near fought thing. The best fighters were getting paralyzed and they were just not hitting the ghouls. In the end, they bested the ghouls and we were out of time.

In the various instances of combat, some had been knocked down and I used the -10 HP is death in AD&D. They were stabilized and clerics were able to give them enough HP to have positive HP. I handle negative HP as serious and the player is unconscious for one hour per point of negative. This forces characters to be encumbered with an unconscious character, if they push on, or having to find a place to rest in relative safety. They were all experienced players and chose to hole up and rest each time players were incapacitated.

During the ghoul fight, several characters went into negative HP. They were pretty chewed up, but had find some nice treasure. I didn’t keep track, but I don’t think it would have been enough XP for 9 characters to level.

Boot Hill

Boot Hill sequel to last year’s game. The two in the middle played last year.

Last year, I ran a Boot Hill 2e [Affiliate Link] game, A Posse For The School Marm. All of the players asked for a sequel for next year. So I brought a sequel, Meanwhile, Back At The Ranch , that we played Friday night at the same table as Hommlet that morning.

Two of the players from last year made it, and brought their character sheets. The group played smart and rolled well. The rules for Boot Hill 2e [Affiliate Link] are very light. I realized I was not using an option that would have made the gunfights last longer. I made the big bad tough, but not fast enough. The players grabbed the pregens that had the fastest characters, which I forgot I rolled some really nice scores for the pregens. (Why can’t I roll that well for my own characters?)

We had a lot of fun and there were requests for another sequel, so I will have to scratch my head on that one. I didn’t have a ready made scenario like I did after last year.

I ended the day in the bar, but went to bed earlier. I was able to sleep in as I didn’t have my first scheduled game until 8:00 PM Saturday.

Macchiato Monsters

I slept in Saturday and got in on a game of Macchiato Monsters [Affiliate Link] ran by Brett Slocum. I had a play games all weekend pass, which makes it easy to slip into games with openings.

I had never played Macchiato Monsters [Affiliate Link] , but it is described as a cross between Black Hack [Affiliate Link] and White Hack. I’ve played Black Hack and have both 1st and 2nd edition. I’ve never seen nor played White Hack.

It has a great deal of freedom in character creation and requires players to be creative, as one chooses a self-defined character within the parameters set by character creation.

It was a fun time and a full table. We all played as a team and ended with a whirlwind wrap up by the GM, as there was more module than time would allow, but we got a feel for the rules. It is much more reliant on role play but dice do come into play. Creativity and an open mind are key. I’m definitely intrigued and will look into picking up both Macchiato Monsters [Affiliate Link] and White Hack.

NOTE: White Hack is only available on Lulu and does not have a PDF.

Playtesting The Card Game

Ready and waiting for the players.

While I have had lots of playtesting of the card game at two game stores, two Gary Cons, two Marmalade Dogs, and now two UCons, this was the first time I had a playtest on the official schedule at a con. This was also the first time I had played in the board game area. I had strolled through it just to see what was going on in prior years.

I had one person pre-registered, and two other players for the first round of playtesting. One player, the youngest, in his 20’s left before the first hand was played. He went to join a game one of his friends was running. I had one person walking by who we invited to join the second game.

The consensus was that they all liked it, but felt it needs something more. The big thing is the game lasted nearly an hour. This is because the end condition for the game is dependent on how long it takes for a control card to come up twice. In this case, it was very late in both halves of the game.

While I understand the suggestions, it runs the risk of either breaking something that works, or making a very simple game more complex. It is interesting that about half the players who have played it, likes the rules as is, and the other half want something more.

I have some ideas for how to have two ways to play, a simple rules default and a full rules option.

In the current rules, each card does one thing. That is the strength of the rules. The challenge is to have additional rules and options for some cards that will not break the game or make it overly complicated.

I also honed my elevator pitch for the card game: Each player is building their own army in the midst of challenges. The player with the largest army (most points) wins.

All in all, I had great feedback from people who play a lot of games, and one of them also designs his own games. He had a WWII war in the Pacific naval simulation that I and another player from the playtest played after the time was up. It was a lot of fun and while it needs a bit of polish, I look forward to seeing it again next year.

The game developer player’s game partner stopped by midway through the WWII game and they are working on a space combat game that they have been playtesting at conventions for several years, including Gencon. They had a game slated for the next morning and invited me to join. I was very intrigued by their description.

[Earlier today I got the first piece of complete line art in preparation for the coming Kickstarter. I’ve got concept sketches for over a dozen cards, and hope to have many more soon.]

Space Combat Game

Setting up for the battle.

The name of the game is Star Blast. This was the last play test prior to publishing. Their plan it to put the rules on DriveThruRPG to get it out there, then do a Kickstarter to make a board game out of it.

They use Excel to make the ship sheets. Each ship has sensors, power, shields, weapons, etc. This very loosely reminds me of the original Star Fleet Battles from the mid 80s. I played a lot of Star Fleet Battles with my brother, Robert, and our friend Darryl.

Another player and I were space pirates out for resources. The other team represented the system with the resources. We had a railgun battle cruiser and a torpedo cruiser and a beam cruiser. They had a carrier with two fighter squadrons and a frigate. Our ships outclassed theirs.

We won almost all of the rolls to determine turn order. The first turn we elected to let the other team go first, so we could react to them. We then tried to move in and find a clear shot. There were lots of asteroids and gas clouds that limited the effectiveness of long shots.

I commanded the torpedo cruiser and beam cruiser. I moved to intercept and fired on their frigate and got a long range hit. Their carrier moved to a certain range and released fighters, then it got behind a gas cloud. The fighters and the frigate did some damage to one of the light cruisers, but damage control repaired it.

Our side focused on the fighters before they could get back to the carrier to get more torpedoes. We managed to hurt them a bit. Another few shots on the frigate and it had “fires”. Since a fire in space could easily be put out, it was explained that fire was shorthand for cascading system failures.

The damage control rules required a certain roll on a d6 to repair. One either failed to repair, or the roll revealed that damage control discovered the system was irreparable. The problem with fires is if you don’t put them out, there is a chance they spread.

That is what too out the frigate. It had a huge number of fires and eventually it fell apart.

My torpedo cruiser took a few hits as it went in to help the battle cruiser against the carrier and the fighters. The battle cruiser just couldn’t line up a killing shot on the carrier. We managed to shrink one fighter squadron, but the weapon on the carrier plus the speed and torpedoes of the fighters started fires on the torpedo cruiser and those fires multiplied until it was weakened enough that it basically fell apart.

We reduced the fighters some more, but time ran out before we could line up fatal blows to the carrier. The pirates won the scenario as we had the most ships remaining.

The frigate was no match for our ships and was better suited to screening the carrier than trying to face us. The fighters with their speed and torpedoes were killer if the carrier was in a safe position to launch and able to recover them for re-arming with their tough weapons. Fighter also had beams, but had to be in close.

I had a lot of fun, and had not played any sort of miniatures battle since the early 90’s. I am looking forward to seeing this released. When I know more, I will be sure to mention it hear and on the podcast.

Final turn of the battle before one of my ships was destroyed.

Farewells

I said my goodbyes to those who left before I did. I joined friends in the lounge to chat for a couple hours before I decided I better head home before dark. I really didn’t want to leave. I’m looking forward to next year.

You can hear the companion podcast here.