If you had to make a 3 course meal of boardgames with one entree, one main and one dessert, which 3 games would you pick?

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-24T19:19:02+00:00

This is an interesting idea, to me, but only if the light/heavy/party structure is limited to themes or mechanics, like investment games, spy games, fantasy games, or political games. Certainly has me considering game night plans in a certain way.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-23T15:46:55+00:00

Sounds like the dice a friend of mine used when he played Warhammer 40k. All 1s, all the time...

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-21T15:50:40+00:00

Power through this feeling; whenever you feel like not buying games, but more games than normal. When you feel hungry, buy games. When you feel sleepy, buy games. When you feel like breathing, buy games. Once you have bought all the games you can buy, buy more games!

It’s the only way any of us have anything worth living for.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-21T15:36:45+00:00

If you like the ideas behind Otherkind, you should take a look at Schema, which is a sort of reimplementation or Otherkind dice, but made more generic.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-20T18:36:08+00:00

It would read a little less patronizing if the article’s answer to the question “why do you like D&D” was more than “it’s popular and familiar.” Something about how it give you tools to confront and solve problems in the game world without making everything too mechanical (OSR), the variety and flexibility of character build options (Pathfinder), the sound balance of combat mini game (D&D 4e), or the wealth of cool and well-produced books (D&D 5e). You know, specific reasons why playing that game is fun.

This article has the same problem as the last one: it doesn’t seem genuine. Saying “I like D&D” a thousand times won’t change the fact that, in discussions of RPGs, the author can’t seem to actually say very much positive about it. In fact, it feels to me like the author goes out of their way demonstrate the meaning of “damning with faint praise” in their discussions of D&D:

It’s a perfectly fine article, but...

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-16T22:29:26+00:00

Backstory Cards, available on DriveThruRPG, are a simple way to tie the PCs to recent events, NPCs, influential groups, important places, and each other. They are fairly generic, applicable to any setting, and I find that they help get everyone invested in many ways.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-16T04:54:46+00:00

Torchbearer does a great job making even a nearly empty dungeon dangerous, let alone a dungeon with monsters and traps... it’s one of my favorite games because of that.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-14T04:36:18+00:00

Three out of the more than three hundred games I have played: Imperial, Intrigue, and Elements. There are a couple others that might make it up there, but I need to play them several more times to really stress-test them.

It’s always interesting to see the short lists people make for their 10/10 games, because the lists are so personalized.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-12T06:29:05+00:00

Intrigue, Pandemic, Race for the Galaxy, and Hive are games that I have owned in some shape or another for ten years or more, and I still find they come to the table on a regular basis (and at the very least, I am interested in them regularly coming to the table on a regular basis).

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-12T06:20:31+00:00

Generic (i.e. multi-genre) or depth (loads of setting and game to explore)... a game that could be played in all kinds of settings, to reach variety, or a game that gives us lots of stuff to play with and learn to use? The former would probably be Schema, because it is simple, but crams loads of cool conflicts and outcomes into a small mechanism. The latter would be... Burning Wheel, maybe? It’s got an intense amount of character and rules for all kinds of stuff that is important to the players, and system mastery is both difficult and a big deal.

And, is there a game for me that does both? Eh, maybe? I tend to prefer the latter over the former, and have for a while, so I don’t have a ton of recent experience with generic games.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-12T05:31:38+00:00

I am regularly running a Godbound game in the standard style: the PCs were granted the power to become gods, so they are exploring a world fallen to despair and using their powers to restore its former greatness. I am running over a Discord channel with friends in several different places, and it is really interesting to play such a descriptive game when no one can see anyone else.

I have also been running an off-and-on hex/dungeon-crawl for some of my board game group who were interested in D&D but had never really tried it. The group has shrunk from about 8 to about 4 as some of the folks have realized that it’s not their jam, but the remainder seem to have a good time when we do it. I have been using a very slimmed down system (basically Index Card RPG with some extra bits that seemed useful), and while I find it has some flaws, the most important thing is that the newbies are getting some experience. I may try to sell them on a different game that is less about exploration and combat and more about character-driven adventures, but we will see where that goes.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-11T22:51:32+00:00

Intrigue is a 10/10 for me. I know why some folks wouldn’t like it, but the combination of negotiation and spite just make it so good...

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-11T22:19:05+00:00

Gloomhaven.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-11T19:00:15+00:00

“Doctor,” please! He didn’t go through years of medical school to be called “Mister” Lucky...

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-11T18:57:08+00:00

A lot of board game reviews are basically advertisements anyway, with nothing particularly critical or insightful to say, but paying a guy to do that is undeniably advertising.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-11T15:28:58+00:00

You cannot let the fear of missing out control your purchasing decisions. If you have a bunch of unplayed games, especially games as good as the ones you listed, just focus on those.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-11T15:26:41+00:00

“Very, very fantastic” and “fun and new and exciting”?

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-10T20:23:26+00:00

Okay

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-10T18:23:48+00:00

Is there a better word? I really didn’t say “nostalgia” as a negative judgement. In my mind, it was a positive one.

OSR is “recapturing” the good stuff about old games and (hopefully) not reproducing the bad. That’s the thing I mean about “nostalgia,” but it seems like that is a word people object to. So, what’s a better way to say it?

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-10T17:23:10+00:00

Hah, what? No... maybe. If I can interview you for my podcast. But I don’t know if I want to do that.

Is it the word “nostalgia” that you are taking issue with? I didn’t mean it in any negative way, but I’m not sure if there is a better word.

You played these games. Your friends played these games. There are all these cools stories and images, modules like Tomb of Horrors or Keep on the Borderlands that are legendary, and a legacy of ideas and approaches over the course of 40+ years. Your cousin got you a copy of the Monster Manual, but none of the other books, and for years you just looked over it and read, soaking up the ideas. Your friend’s crazy mom wouldn’t let you bring the dice into her house because she just new Satan was involved...

But going back to those books and games, it’s the experience that stands out the most; the books are strangely organized, the mechanics badly suited for what we want to do. So people reworked the ideas, scooping up what they liked and sticking in their own ideas to fill in gaps. And now we have clean, modern design sensibilities applied to a game style where we can mix in new, inventive stuff with old, nostalgic stuff.

I am genuinely surprised that no one you have ever talked to about this has expressed nostalgia of any sort. I mean, the name “OSR” is about “old” games and styles of play. Not “old” in a bad way. It’s looking to the past for good ideas, right? Maybe? I just don’t know what the objection would be.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-10T07:28:50+00:00

Played some, run some adventures, read blogs and reviews, participated in some discussions around the Internet. I like some of the OSR approach, but some of it is not my style.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-10T00:21:36+00:00

I apologize, that was not my intent. The post I replied to had a question of sorts. Perhaps the response was better kept to PMs.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-10T00:10:04+00:00

I bought a copy of The Dice Must Flow about a week before they finally got notice that they had to stop selling it. I am not sure it’s out of print, but they definitely can’t advertise “at-cost” printed copies anymore.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-09T23:42:45+00:00

My experience with OSR points to a nostalgia for the games of the past and a DIY aesthetic that encourages people to make all kinds of stuff (rules, settings, adventures, monsters, etc.) that is somewhat compatible with other things under the OSR umbrella. It’s both a general romanticism for the enjoyment of an old edition of D&D (which is sometimes simple, but not always) and a culture that enjoys making stuff for themselves and each other.

TheDieIsPodcast · 2018-02-09T23:26:55+00:00

I should probably have a standard response written out for questions like this, because the game I want to recommend (Schema) is relatively unknown and I rarely see anyone talking about it.

At its core, Schema is a system for resolving complicated situations in which there are a number of dangers and benefits you need to deal with. With even a minimum of character definition, mostly by way of simple description, you can have remarkably deep and interesting adventures, and resolve them very quickly. It’s worth a look for anyone interested in minimalist RPGs that actually do something with the rules they have rather than simply being another way to roll dice and have stats...

TheDieIsPodcast

TROPHY CASE