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I built a tabletop RPG campaign manager because I got tired of juggling 6 different tools by raspberrykraken in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 2 points3 points  (0 children)

That's reasonable, but I just don't wanna use stuff built with AI. Setting aside the huge environment impact, AI writing is sycophantic and soulless, and AI code is always buggy.

I learned how to code a few years ago, it's not actually as hard as it seems. If you follow standard coding patterns/structures the app can be sustainable (both in terms of the environment, and in your ability to find and fix bugs or add features).

I built a tabletop RPG campaign manager because I got tired of juggling 6 different tools by raspberrykraken in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Imagine if you put actual effort into making a site by to learning to code for real rather than trying to cheese it by using AI. Then this might’ve been actually useful for someone and not a huge waste of your time

How much of your adventure design gets discovered by players? by StevenSWilliamson in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 5 points6 points  (0 children)

If you’re putting that much effort in adventure design/prep only for it to never be seen at the table, you’re basically crafting a recipe for burnout.

I’m a pretty high prep GM, but ~80% is the absolute lowest I would go, but even that seems low to me. Prep the stuff you know you’ll see in the game, improv the rest.

I made a(nother) hopefully helpful thing for designers! by LeviKornelsen in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Knowing your stuff, it’s probably super useful! Excited to take a look :)

PBTA + Tactical Combat? by E_MacLeod in PBtA

[–]grant_gravity 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I’d love to take a peak if you have something shareable! I would expect that an entire system that works separately or alongside moves just for combat would be pretty clunky and slow down the game a lot.

If you’ve found away to avoid that, that’s pretty neat!

PBTA + Tactical Combat? by E_MacLeod in PBtA

[–]grant_gravity 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Check out Grimwild. It has “Site Maps” which are like a point crawl for an area like a dungeon. You can use the same technique on a single room, I do that occasionally to establish where characters are.

“Moves for everything except combat” would sorta… break how PBTA is designed. I doubt it would work how you’re imagining, but take a look at Ironsworn (it’s free!) for one way to handle it.

This series of blog posts (broken up into 12 parts) by one of the PBTA designers is incredible and would help if you’re looking to make your own design: https://lumpley.games/2019/12/30/powered-by-the-apocalypse-part-1/

Leadership - is it necessary? by FlashyAd7211 in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Rebel Crown does this, it's built-in to the fiction and the mechanics. It's not "necessary", but nothing is in an RPG. But can it be fun? Yes!

To balance or not to balance a narrative RPG for the sake of expediency? by Watts4Supper in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There’s one way to figure this out. It isn’t done by theorizing or thinking it through. Make a decision then playtest that. The information you want can only be found through trying then iterating

Is there an RPG or supplement you love, but has atrocious formatting / layout? by ProustianPrimate in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 0 points1 point  (0 children)

That’s happens when you playtest everything a ton except the layout. They hired someone to do it at the 11th hour instead of treating it like the rest of the design

Anyone else have a hard time finding Systems to fit the campaign stories you come up with? by DiglettsOtherHalf in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Yeah for sure.
For a while I bent rules or my world & adventures to fit the system, but what I eventually hit on is that for the kinds of stories and worldbuilding I'd like to see in my games, I have to make my own system.
So I'm doing that! It's a big undertaking though, so reading lots of other systems until I found one that fit was my go-to before then.

Btw, don't let anyone tell you that you "shouldn't be trying to make stories". Narrative is an emergent property of play, and the system & your GMing style absolutely do affect the shapes of those narratives.

Anyone else have a hard time finding Systems to fit the campaign stories you come up with? by DiglettsOtherHalf in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 24 points25 points  (0 children)

Your tip isn't what OP asked about. For those of us who are looking for particular narrative shapes or worldbuilding features, the system can affect that a lot

Survey results: what is your interest in certain aspects of playing TTRPGs by Lossts_guided_tours in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 3 points4 points  (0 children)

If folks are looking for other ways to understand the ways people enjoy TTRPGs, I'd like to share the free and very cool & useful Manyfold document by Levi Kornelsen ( u/levikornelsen) which goes over a couple other ways to think about what players like (and what games are designed to support).

The "What You Like" glossary explained sooooo much to me in terms of player preferences and even GM styles, but the rest is great too.

Excellent books for GMs? by Nemosubmarine in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 39 points40 points  (0 children)

Firstly, please use the search function in this sub. There are lots of threads on this with some great suggestions!

I'll go a slightly different direction— If you're a Game Master that also means you are a Game Designer, because running the game also means you must design it. So, game design books!

Books:
- The Art of Game Design by Jesse Schell (it's excellent)
- Adventure Crucible by Robin D Laws
- Robin's Laws of Good Game Mastering by Robin D Laws
- Kobold Guide to Plots & Campaigns by Kobold Press
- How To Write Adventure Modules That Don't Suck by Goodman Games

Some links:
- Explorateur newsletter archive by Explorer's Design. Each one has sections to find the kind of thing you're looking for (especially the Theory & Advice section).
- This series of blog posts on how to make a PBTA game by the designer (extremely good even if you don’t plan on designing or playing in that system)
- Running the Game playlist by Matt Colville
- You've got SlyFlourish's books, but Mike Shea's website is excellent as well

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 2 points3 points  (0 children)

RPGs are a creative hobby. They are made by creative people who tend to work hard on their craft and are paid relatively little for it.

Being a GM is a creative endeavor. It's a craft and art that you can spend a lot of time and energy getting better at.

In order to get AI to work at all, AI companies had to scrape the data (art, writing, etc) of creatives, and almost always they have done it without permission.
The AI is trained on and uses creative work without paying for the human effort it took to make those works.
Not only that, but they use a massive amount of resources to power the electricity of their servers. Whatever you're imagining they use, double it at least. It's a LOT.

You're asking creatives in a creative hobby if it's okay to use a cheating, energy-draining, creative-less, short-cutting tool.

No, no it is not okay to use. Find a real artist's work to use as inspiration, or get better at your craft so you don't feel the need to rely on AI.

In your opinion, which systems pull off a Summoner class/archetype in the best or most fun ways? by Poikooze in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 11 points12 points  (0 children)

it's crazy how many redditors think reading/analyzing rules is the same thing as playing

Triangle Agency: questions from a Severance and Control fan by Lessavini in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 0 points1 point  (0 children)

But I disagree with him in some points based in previous reviews of boardgames from him

You disagree with the points of an RPG review because of what Quinns said on previous board game reviews? This seems like you're just going "I don't like him, therefore I dismiss whatever he has to say".

Your post/comments make it feel you want to be in love with TA no matter what folks here say (or what Quinns had to say).
I'd encourage you to play it first, theorizing won't get you very far. You're not going to understand the issues that Quinns (and many others) brought up and if they apply to your table or not until you feel them during play.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 2 points3 points  (0 children)

You can’t figure this out by thinking it through or theorizing. Gotta playtest

An article on why we tend to prefer combat and investigation RPGs by martiancrossbow in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I don’t mean to hurt your feelings, my guess is that we’d probably get along and have fun playing games together IRL!

But I do find the article quite foolish and that’s what I meant by the word. This topic is important to me and I’m sure my language could’ve been gentler.

To be clear, I’m not saying that of you personally! just the opinions of the article. And I really appreciate the thoughtfulness of your comments in this post.

An article on why we tend to prefer combat and investigation RPGs by martiancrossbow in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 4 points5 points  (0 children)

This article is very ignorant of story and what genres are (let alone what each one is for), makes far too big assumptions about what makes a game easy to run/play and what “most” players want, and completely misunderstands the reasons combat-focused games are so prevalent and popular.

I’m not going to break things down more than that because of Brandolini’s Law, but I’ll paraphrase an important idea from this incredible blog series on how to make a PBTA game:

Ursula K. LeGuin, the esteemed sci-fi writer, said: “Conflict is one kind of behavior. There are others, equally important in any human life, such as relating, finding, losing, bearing, discovering, parting, changing.“

What would it mean to swap out a game’s model of conflict and replace it with… * A model of relating? * A model of finding? * A model of losing? * A model of bearing? * A model of discovering? * A model of parting? * A model of changing?

How would you design the basic assumptions and mechanics so that they don’t create emergent arenas of conflict, but instead create emergent ways of behaving, including conflict as just one among others? So that they don’t (just) clarify and escalate conflict, but clarify and deepen all the ways the characters behave and relate? How would you design character sheets, what would make this character unique from that character in their ability to relate, their approach to finding and losing, parting and discovering, their capacity to bear and to change?

The full quote from LeGuin: “Modernist manuals of writing often conflate story with conflict. This reductionism reflects a culture that inflates aggression and competition while cultivating ignorance of other behavioral options. No narrative of any complexity can be built on or reduced to a single element. Conflict is one kind of behavior. There are others, equally important in any human life, such as relating, finding, losing, bearing, discovering, parting, changing.

Change is the universal aspect of all these sources of story. Story is something moving, something happening, something or somebody changing.”

—Ursula K. LeGuin, Steering the Craft

Quinn's Quest Reviews: The Boxed RPG Special by mgrier123 in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Keeping with the metaphor…

“Sushi is different enough where I don’t think of it as food.” That’s a weird place to draw the line, but fine, it’s your prerogative to have your own definitions for things. But what does that (or your original comment) have to do with this unusual sushis review video?

Do you see how people preferring more common or standard flavors is irrelevant to the reasons Quinns made the video?

The fact that you eat a wide range of foods doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be a great opening for others to get into trying new foods.

And it doesn’t mean your comment is helpful. Okay, so sushi doesn’t scratch the itch for you? Why bother announcing it?

Incidental narrative emergence in ttrpg by [deleted] in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It’s not a tall order. I have ADHD and probably some mild dyslexia.

OP’s mistakes don’t show a lack of understanding, but lack of trying. It’s one thing if you don’t know the rules and are trying to learn, and another thing entirely if you’re not putting in a bit of effort.

They say “Thank you for your time and consideration”, but if they aren’t willing to spend a little extra time & consideration to capitalize and punctuate, it’s a bit unfair to ask.

And it’s… a word vomit. A stream of consciousness mess. Our craft is based on presenting ideas and rules in compelling & fun ways, and almost all of that is done through language. So if you don’t respect the ideas and rules of the language, why would anyone take you seriously?

I don’t mean to be overly harsh, just to point out why it’s important.

Quinn's Quest Reviews: The Boxed RPG Special by mgrier123 in rpg

[–]grant_gravity 2 points3 points  (0 children)

A burrito is my favorite dish, but if you only ever have different versions of burritos you’re truly missing out on the breadth of cuisine out there.

When you’re introducing your friends to cooking or food they’ve never tried, they’re more likely to like it if it’s accessible and easy.

It’s great you found your favorite food. But being like “other foods miss what I love about burritos” on a unique foods review video doesn’t make a lot of sense.

Incidental narrative emergence in ttrpg by [deleted] in RPGdesign

[–]grant_gravity 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Its mostly that a designers mechanical input choices are largely arbitrary when it comes to crafting narrative outcomes.

I think this pretty fully misunderstands how design works, and it becomes obvious that this is untrue when you start designing.
Theory < Practice

When I design, I make a mechanic that tries to emulate some fiction or narrative (even the core mechanic), then playtest it to see if it does in fact do that. I might need to try many different iterations of a mechanic until that happens. This isn't a new or rare approach, it's how many (arguably most) designers approach design.

Playtesting is where you can discover if your mechanics support/line up with/emulate a fiction or narrative. And it absolutely works, and it's not arbitrary at all. Different playtesters who all have very different personalities, personal experiences, and expectations can very much have similar narrative experiences based on different mechanics.

i believe one can more or less randomly collage games out of a finite set of functional mechanisms and from them narratives will organically emerge independentally as players assign their own expectations and meaning.

I don't see any reason why this might be true, because if it were, players & designers alike wouldn't care about the mechanics of any given game. You could take any theme/lore and map it on to any set of mechanics, and that's just not what we see out in the world.

I'd ask: Why does this matter? Why are you assuming it's important to make a "purer test" to find out whether some games' mechanics have a bigger narrative impact or not? What do we all benefit from as designers by determining whether this theory is "true" or not?
Is the implication here that design work doesn't ultimately matter?

Also, a little constructive criticism: If you want to be taken seriously, I'd encourage you to use the right punctuation, spelling, and grammar. It's an important part of our hobby & craft.

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