Dice are important to RPGs. I’ve talked a lot about the arbitration between narrative and mechanics, but whatever balance a specific RPG system strikes, it is a nearly universal rule that the mechanics require some form of randomization. The traditional method; dice.

This is a very long-winded way of saying almost every RPG uses dice to help decide what happens in the game.

The Palace of Lothvar had once been a towering display of beauty and glory. Ten spires had risen to meet the blue skies of olden years, and a courtyard of massive expanse stretched out in a glittering rotundra of grass, trees, and flowers from across the land. It had been a cathedral to the Duke and his reign.

Now, it was collapsing into ruin. Three of the spires had collapsed into the courtyard, crushing half the garden and uprooting the old oak that had grown there for over a hundred years — according to old Teek the Monk. The gardentender only worked for half each day, doing little more than poking the crawling vines back from the stone walkways, and making sure none of the remaining tree branches were able to fall on someone’s head.

“What happens next?”

It is, perhaps the pinnacle of the medium. All the preparation, all the imagination, all the dice and chips and conversation all depends on that one procedure, that game-loop, that single question.

What happens next?

We answer the question in a myriad of ways with a myriad of tools. We think of our characters, and what their emotions or worldviews might push them to do. We think about the story, and what might be fitting. We think of ourselves, and consider what we would find interesting or exciting. We think of our dice, and decide what actions are most likely to succeed. Sometimes, we are simply inspired.

So I’ve been somewhat unkind to Dungeons and Dragons, I’m sure you’ve noticed.

I have my reasons for that, and I don’t really care to rant about them here, again, for those of you who aren’t sympathetic. If you love D&D, great! Go buy the next edition, and I hope you have a great time with it!

But for those of you who are at least curious about the world beyond the Red Wizards of the Coast, I would like to hand you a stepping stone, as it were. A small collection of simple RPGs that I think will be an easy and gentle dipping-of-toes-in to the alternatives. Better to try one of these first than jump straight into Wanderhome or Noumenon.

The sour scent of rancid meat and decaying flowers was faint in the air, this evening. Bally thanked the heavens for small mercies, before catching himself. Any thanks that made their way through the thick clouds would certainly echo in empty halls of marble and gold.

Who had said the halls of the heavens were marble and gold? Bally scratched his nose in thought. It hadn’t been Old Grunby, the dottering hag-priestess, whose joints cracked like crumbling cliffs every time she moved, and spoke of the gods with the passionate furvor of an ancient shaman dancing around a bonfire. It hadn’t been the dottering monk…what was his name…Teek? Yes, that was it. The perpetually grinning old soak spun tales of the heavens like a father lulling his children to sleep, slurring his littanies with both ale and wandering tangents. No. It hadn’t been him…

Who had it been?

I have championed the idea of Cold Opens and Session Zeros, but perhaps been a little coy about the practicalities. What sort of questions and discussions should go into a Session Zero?

There are some obvious answers, such as establishing Lines and Veils, to say nothing of setting and system; but I’ve spent a long time discussing how much more complex a game is than just setting and system. What about Tone? Best practices? Table expectations?

Well, a lot of that requires very personal answers, but I can offer a few ideas. What follows are some suggestions based on what I’ve gleaned from my looking into the genre and importance of Session Zero conversations.

So, what’s all this then?

Well, it turns out that people didn’t stop making RPGs once I finished writing and posting The RPG Medium. Go figure. On top of that, it turns out that there are a lot of games that I didn’t see before I wrote the treatise, some of which fit better than the ones I had chosen to support a specific concept or question.

I’m not going to rewrite my old work, but over time enough new RPGs have crossed my path that it makes sense for me to continue the treatise; an Errata, if you will, that brings in new ideas and supports some old ones.

So to start with, I’d like to lay out a few assumptions going forward; things that are important, but aren’t substantial enough to warrant their own post.

A month and some change later, and I’m back. Am I ready to be back? That’s a different question. I have pondered the idea of extending my hiatus, but that way lies inertia, and I have enough issues with that these days, thank-you-very-much. So every concern must be dismissed. My buffer is still unsatisfactory…but what would be enough? Noriama still little better than a second draft? Let it be seen anyway, warts and all.

I swear I didn’t plan it this way. I wouldn’t have if I could have; I’m put now in a somewhat difficult position of wrapping up both The Poems of Madam Albithurst and The Watch in the Sand in one post. I’d rather do it over two, but time and tide wait for no one; So… The Poems of Madam Albithurst Did my experiment work? It’s obviously not my place to say.

November 15, 2048 Serious discussion begins on the Boards on how to restructure the governments of the world, given the advances in communication and Nanocule technology. Some in America suggest decentralizing the major halls of policy; demolishing the White House, 10 Downing Street, the Kremlin, et. al., and moving all official correspondence to the Boards. Others argue for dismantling the concept of representative government entirely, and moving to a pure democracy.