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Showing posts from January, 2016

Foam Cutter

I built a foam cutter today. It works great. I get start into the wonderful world of foam terrain.

Interesting Encounter: Hillbilly Island

Interesting encounters are short descriptions of encounters that GMs can use to build on.  They combine unique aspects of different types of foes, terrain, skill checks, weather, combat, etc in order to provide more unique challenges than hit monster; repeat. Hillybilly island is inspired by the X-Files Episode "Home". If you haven't watched it, I will wait while you go catch it on Netflix real quick. Ok, so this encounter takes place on an island which you can place anywhere, making it a nice excursion during a sea voyage. This island is surrounded by dangerous rocks and there are strange sea monsters that live in the seas nearby, both of which result in many shipwrecks. Along the edge of the island lay the hulks of ships, new and old, claimed by these dangers. The PCs arrive via shipwreck caused by the rocks or a sea monsters. The island is very small and has two buildings. The smaller building is a shed. The larger building is a house. Both are rickety, one story

Injury instead of Death

In some game you want to build a character and run all the way from beginning to end to see all the levels, gather all the experience and loot, and have an epic tale for the ages. In these games, consider dispensing with death rules and instead substituting injuries. Wait, what?! You can't do that. There is no reward without risk. What will make the players afraid if their characters can't die? That isn't very old school of you. Is this a more millenial PC way of gaming?! What, are you afraid of making your players cry? Yeah, I have heard all the arguments. The bottom line is that the game is about what the players and GM make it about. Don't force your way of thinking on someone else's game. Death rules, like any other rules, can be changed if so desired. Everyone gets to play their own game. There is a valid point in the criticism -- there has to be some consequence to making choices. If dying isn't it, what do we use instead?  Of course, we could use th