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, then jump straight into Wanderhome or Noumenon.
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.
Wait, wait!
Not finished yet, I guess…
Call it an errata, if you wish, but the truth is there are simply too many games and too many complex aspects of RPGs to ever really be “finished.” Even in the process of writing this, games have come out that are far better examples of, say, experiments with Game Balance or explorations of real-time than the examples I used.
And that’s nothing compared to the subjects I haven’t even broached.
When I first started this…I guess you could call it a project, I did it for weird reasons. I had been struggling with my other writing projects, hitting brick wall after brick wall, forcing my fingers to type out trite and uninteresting sentences that advanced boring stories with empty souls, to the point where sitting down to write was becoming an act of self-harm. My brain began its spiraling semi-regularly, and it began to adversely affect my relationships with my friends, family, and myself.
I wanted to end this project with a discussion of this game, because for all the myriad of games I have mentioned in this journey of ours, Wanderhome differs in perhaps some of the most significant and profound ways from all the others.
Based on the Belonging Outside Belonging system (also called “No dice, no masters”) from the Dream Askew and Dream Apart games, Wanderhome is, quote: “a pastoral fantasy roleplaying game about traveling animal-folk, the world they inhabit, and the way the seasons change.
In Nowhere Kingdom, the players take the role of a council of advisors and gentry charged with suggesting policies and proposals to the ruling Demons of the Kingdom. Thankfully, these demons are not evil; just mildly cruel, mostly bored, and they only get to rule the Kingdom for a year — their price for overthrowing the previous tyrant.
As the game progresses, random problems land on the council-table and the council-members must all come up with proposals to solve them.
Noumenon is an RPG…and frankly, that’s almost all I’m prepared to say categorically about it.
Noumenon is a system designed to facilitate an exploration of a surreal dream. Characters wake up as the insect-like Sarcophagi trapped within the Silhouette Rouge, and they barely have time to look around before they are approached by a well-dressed three-eyed elephant-headed being who guides them to a sweeping staircase with only thirty-three steps that reaches all the way up and out of a hundred-story-high cavern.
Do Not Read This Journal is a horror journaling RPG, but I hesitate to call it a Solo experience. Certainly, the process of journaling in the game is akin to other Solo RPGs, along with its cards and oracles. The significant difference is, once you have finished your journaling — your “turn,” as it were — you tuck the rules into the first page of the journal and pass it on to someone else.
Hero Quest is the best game ever made.
The best thing about Hero Quest is the gold. Every quest grants your characters gold that can be used to acquire cracking equipment that improves your character’s chances at surviving their next quest.
Okay, but is Hero Quest really an RPG? Perhaps, perhaps not. If it is, it certainly leans heavily into the strategy-board game side of RPGs, similar to the RPG-like Gloomhaven or Betrayal at House on the Hill.
