Representation (Just Like This Panel) Is Important (And Awesome)

The difference between the second panel I attended and the first was like emerging from a den of ignorance and into the shining light of truth. This panel had actual creators - Amy Chu and Alitha Martinez were especially impressive - and an amazing moderator, Alex Simmons. We talked about the problems creators and characters of color (say that three times fast) face every day, the differences between creating for DC or Marvel versus doing indie comics, and online racial/sexual harassment, to name a few. Each panelist had a unique individual perspective and was aware enough of the general milieu to provide an excellent basis for discussion. We even talked about solutions to said problems.

Left to Right: Alex Simmons, Amy Chu, Alitha Martinez,
Laura Lee Gulledge, Jeremy Whitley

"You gotta wait for those old guards who just don't get it to die." - Alex Simmons

Paraphrasing Alitha Martinez: You need to make new characters, not just colorize a classic.

We talked a bit about "voting with your dollar," and it made perfect sense at the time. But how do we get the  general (let's be honest, still predominantly white, male, and straight) comic book audience to vote with us? And how to we communicate that we're buying, for example, Captain Marvel because Carol Danvers is an interesting character and not because Carol Danvers is an attractive blonde? Food for thought...

P.S. I need to be reading Amy Chu's Girls Night Out starting YESTERDAY. Just ordered my copy!

"Yes, There Are Girl Gamers. No, They Are Not Hosting This Panel."

First post of my Awesome Con recap starts on a low note: the panelists from Nexus Gaming Alliance "resident Gaming Ladies" all canceled, leaving two people I believe to be "the Nexus chiefs" to run the show. Two of the first things out of the (biologically) female moderator's mouth were "I am not a gamer" and "my brain is male*." Her only claim to fame was that she was "friends with" some professional gamers. Okay... if you are not a female gamer and claim no credible expertise about gaming in general, what are you doing hosting this panel?

She did provide some interesting statistics, like 68% of households play video games and 40% of the gamer population is female. But it quickly became clear that these were derived from a web search. While some of them might have been credible, it would have served her better to cite peer-reviewed articles. Like, I dunno, articles from any of these journals.

Awesome Con Diversity Track

The second  annual Awesome Con, DC's pop culture and comics convention, is this weekend! The first year was kind of a mixed bag for me. As some of you know, I yelled at a panel moderator for being blatantly sexist (while I myself was cosplaying as Lt. Uhura from Star Trek TOS). Mimosas may have been involved. 

ANYWAY. That's all the in past. This year's programming has a healthy dose of panels discussing representations of women and people of color. Here they are complied in one handy place - I call this the "diversity track," since they're basically all filed under different tracks on the Awesome Con website. 

Saturday

11AM - Saturday Morning Gets Funky: "this panel take audiences back to the 70's when black characters became popular in main stream cartoons."

1PM - Yes, There Are Girl Gamers: "discussing the silly behavior of men online." [Promising title, but the summary is a bit flippant for my taste. Let's see how this plays out... pun intended because my puns are always intended.]

2:30 - Representation Is Important: "Come and learn what comics creators are doing to help the diversity of the world change comics and hopefully help those comics change the world." 

Sunday

11:30 - Sexism, Violence, and Geekdom: "discuss depictions of masculinity, femininity, and gender-based violence in the geek community." 

12:45 - Women In Comics: "discuss women in cartoon-land: characters and creators, the changing world of comics, and how they make their livings with pen, paper, and a mouse or two." 

Hope to see you there! 

Check out Gigargun!

Is there a nerd in the world that hasn't dreamed of donning a robotic suit to go toe-to-toe with a gigantic monster? A friend of mine, Duffy, is involved in creating a new tabletop RPG called Gigargun that allows players to do just that. Here's an excerpt from his latest blog post:

[The world of Gigargun] has dealt with the existence of giant monsters for over half a century and has almost become jaded to its own wonder. We are populating it with corporations, cults, militias, and criminal organizations that trade in giant monsters. We are devising scenarios where you will be challenged in new and creative ways that take advantage of the world.

Now, I haven't had a chance to play test Gigargun yet. Luckily, my Best Frenemy Mac was able to play it at Tabletop Game Day at our FLGS. And he shared with me one of my favorite gaming stories to date. Apparently a father brought in his two sons for Tabletop Game Day, and the younger one was painfully shy. Already I'm like, "I know that feel, little bro." But then this:

We would all ask him what he wanted to do and he would sit there quietly staring down at the table for a few seconds until his father said, "Would you like to _____?" and he'd nod, someone would put the die in his hand and he'd roll it.

Then the undead whale surfaced (which is apparently a real thing in Japanese mythology, who knew). The kid was on top of our ship, riding his giant lion-looking pet monster, and this time when Duffy asked him, "What would you like to do?" He looked up for maybe the first time, and calmly said, "I would like to jump onto it's back, dig my way down inside of it, and rip it's heart into pieces until it dies."

The table fell silent, then Duffy leaned forward and patted him on the head, and said, "Yes. Yes, that is going to happen now." And we proceeded to make it happen, step by step, over the next few combat rounds. Thanks to a few very good rolls, including a critical hit on the heart itself, we won a few rounds later.

DON'T YOU JUST LOVE IT?!? As much as I love D&D, I have a hard time envisioning something like this happening in that system. This gives me the impression that Gigargun's mechanics are flexible enough to handle just about anything. Even more importantly, it shows that the stories you can tell with Gigargun are evocative enough to bring all our shy inner eight-year olds out of their shells.

Duffy, when do I get to play?

Unconventional Skill Challenge

Instead of our usual "add your scores together to beat this total," or the conventional "X number of successes before Y failures," I tried something different with this week's skill challenge. I gave my players a rather open-ended prompt and challenged them to create a cohesive narrative. If they work together to tell a story, they'll get a reward (a magical item). Otherwise, participation still earns them our home-rule "DM credit" (gives you +2 to any roll or allows you to re-roll any damage die). Here's the story so far...

DM: "What's in the box?"

While searching the corpses of the kobolds you have just slain, you find a sealed box. It is made of wood, stained dark red, and the outside is covered in strange carved images and symbols. It looks somewhat battered, but the construction is sturdy and sound. Initial* attempts to pry it open are unsuccessful. There doesn't seem to be any kind obvious* locking mechanism. It does not have a strongly apparent* magical aura.

*Please note the deliberate use of qualifiers. I'm not trying to say Strength, Thievery, or Arcana won't help. You just know opening the box won't be easy.

Murder Mystery Mechanics

Long time no post! I have been working hard on various games, especially the murder mystery party I'm hosting next week. This time, we're trying to introduce some simple mechanics into the game, in order to give people an incentive to participate and provide a more straight-forward way of solving the mystery. Here's some of the flavor text I've shared with the players so far:

This murder mystery will be a mafia-inspired game of informed minority (Conspiracy) vs uninformed majority (Innocents). You can try to bribe, intimidate, or trick your fellow players into giving you clues. The team that has the most clues/cash at the end of the night wins. But be careful - there’s a murderer on the loose, and you never know when they’ll strike next!

When sexism goes a-rye

(via Dorkly)

D&D Puzzle/Trap Room

The party enters a large cavern (or room). The only thing inside it a three-foot tall white stone idol. The idol is brightly illuminated from above, obscuring its features. You cannot discern the source of the light. 

Arcana Check 

Easy:  There is an almost overwhelming amount of magical energy filling the entire room. 

Moderate: The energy seems to be emanating from the idol itself. 

Additionally, to any PC with experience in the Underdark this energy seems a bit familiar. To any gnome PC, the energy is familiar and even welcoming. 

If the PCs send someone in first (with some people staying outside), there is a kind of spacial warping effect - they move normally but can't cover the distance between the door and the statue. There are no apparent exits from this room. If the characters decide to give up and leave, you could have them turn around and go back the way they came... only to have the same room appear before them in the other direction. This should suffice to should the PCs that they all must enter the room. As soon as the last one steps inside...

The second you step inside, you feel a slight bump at your back. When you turn around, you see nothing but a smooth wall. A moment later, you blink and find yourselves standing in a semicircle around the illuminated idol. 

Religion Check

Easy: This appears to be a gnome deity. 

Moderate (or Easy for a gnome PC): This is Calladuran Smoothhands, god of the svirfneblin.

Difficult (or Moderate for a gnome PC): Calladuran Smoothhands is a neutral deity, the god of the darkness beneath the earth, magic, protection, and... trickery. (Mwahahahaha!)

Email Skill Challenge II: Responses (Part 2)

Character: Valna, half-elf barbarian

Player: Maggie

Valna, with adrenaline still coursing through her from the fight with the Jellies, tossed and turned on the hard stone floor. She was much more comfortable sleeping on good, soft earth, rather than cold stone. But needs must.

She knew her companions were also struggling to find sleep; Stumbleduck {aka Elyjobel} (Valna just couldn't get used to this new fancy name she wanted everyone to call her by) and Bigglesby were muttering to themselves, Travok was moving rocks around, and the others moved about restlessly in their bedrolls. The cave had caused a chill to creep into Valna's bones and she shivered. No matter. Valna had slept in worse places.

Primary Check - Endurance: 26

Since sleep was clearly not comimg easily, Valna replayed the day's battles in her mind. Especially the part where she rode Glitterstich to victory and plucked Travok from the dark water. That part was especially awesome. "Hey guys," she softly called to her companions. "I just want to say how impressed I am with the strength and power you all showed in the recent battle. It is clear that no foe can stand before us."

Secondary Check - Diplomacy: 33



Character: Elyjobel, gnome illusionist

Player: Mac 

{Here's the second half of Mac's submission. As you will see, he ties right into the previous response AND tugs at the DMs heart-strings. Well played, sir, well played.}

Ely turned awkwardly in her bedroll, shifting until she faced the wall, trying to hide the effect that Valna's words had on her. She'd always looked up to the powerful woman, and in the light of Kismet's betrayal, when Ely realized she had to become tougher, stronger than the flighty illusionist she'd been all her childhood, there was an obvious choice for role model. Earlier that very day, while Valna and Bigglesby had been off exploring an offshoot, the rest of the party had fought swarms of spiders. Not only had Ely fought off the poison coursing through her system during that combat, but she slew many of the creepies herself. Slowly, she felt, she was starting to live up to the example Valna set. One day, she might even be strong enough to save her best friend from the darkness his uncle had forced into his life. For Kismet's sake, she tried to feel sympathy for his family. For her own sake, seeing the darkness Prismeus had willingly given himself over to infect her oldest companion... if she could, she'd let Prismeus's soul burn forever.

Thinking of her friend gave her an idea. One of the first illusions she learned was a spell named Ghost Sound, a little cantrip which allowed her to call sounds out of thin air. The spell itself was designed to be cast quickly in combat, and make a few simple, quick sounds, but perhaps she'd grown skillful enough to adapt it to current circumstances...

Worried that she might call up bad memories of the bard's betrayal, Ely nevertheless wove the patterns of energy, delving deep into her mind for an old, old memory... Excellence, Kismet's mother, had taken to bed with a fever. It truthfully was nothing more than a simple illness that anyone would shake off after a day's rest, but her son was only seven and, dutiful son he was, worried so for her health. He'd only recently started training in music, but he sat up with her all night as she twitched in fitful sleep, plucking at his harp a simple, soothing lullaby. As the hours passed, Excellence's fever finally broke, and she settled into deep, restful sleep her body needed.

Ely recalled that song now, the ingenuous strident plucking of a young boy holding a harp for the first time, and called the quiet notes into the air. She could not grant the true peace that a trained Bard's Song of Rest could gift, but perhaps this melody would remind her party of the many restful nights granted to them by their friend and Bard; maybe it would soften their hearts, let them see, as Ely did, that the tiefling did not truly betray them, he was a dear friend, a companion who had earned their implicit trust many times over, currently victim to terrible darkness. And maybe, just maybe, she could help settle fiery blood and stormy minds, and let everyone catch the restful sleep they so urgently needed to defeat the foul orcs.

Primary Check - Arcana: 32

When GMs exceed their XP budgets

(via Anxious Comic)

Email Skill Challenge II: Responses (Part 1)

My players did a great job role-playing with this latest skill challenge! Here are some highlights {with my notes in fancy brackets}:


Character: Ely, gnome illusionist
Player: Mac

Though the Maiden of the Moon was an Archfey, not a proper deity, there were nevertheless many sects throughout the lands that worshipped the Fey as Gods. Elyjobel saw Bigglesby tossing restlessly, and gently called out his name. "Tell me of the Hunt; tell me of the thrill of the chase, noble woodsman. Tell me of the nights spent in trees, enduring now for the sake of glory later..." If she recalled her practical theology well, her phrasing should strike a chord in the halfling and remind him of the precepts he still lived by, even far from the Maiden's camp; if she spoke poorly, she risked reminding him of better times and worsening his depression...

Secondary Check - Religion: 34 [Nat 20, yo!]

{Mac asked specifically if he could hold off his Primary Roll, so that he'd get a bonus from someone else right off the bat}


Character: Bigglesby, halfling ranger
Player: Tristan

Bigglesby's couldn't get comfortable on the damp stone. He much preferred a dry bed of leaves under soaring canopies, or even the soft, arid dust of the Feymoon. Underground was no environment for a halfling, especially in the cavernous high caves of the Underdark. How could anyone feel cozy here? Softly, he heard Elyjobel reach out to him and recite the Call to Share. He didn't think Elyjobel actually wanted his stories - there was no proper campfire and this night they needed rest. But he appreciated the effort. He began to softly recite one of his favorite stories, just as a murmur, and it helped strengthen his resolve.

Primary Check - Endurance: 27

{I'm not all that familiar with D&D lore, mostly by choice. I've seen it used too often by pedantic nerds to prove their "superiority" over more casual players. But this? LOVED IT. I guess the difference is that it dovetails perfectly with what we know of the characters. And it moves us closer to the goal, of course.}

Thinking of the Call to Share made Bigglesby miss the roaring fires of the forest. He knew that a big fire would be dangerous in this space, but perhaps, before he drifted off, he could make something that would warm one of his compatriots. A few mushrooms in a corner of the cave looked dry enough to use as tinder. Tearing them up and spreading them out, Bigglesby quickly set to work creating a small flame.

Secondary Check - Nature: 29


Charachter: Travok, dwarf fighter
Player: Reuven

Despite all of the pent-up rage Travok has simmering internally, he's surprisingly calm in light of all of the recent excitement. Still, it does take some doing to get all of the residual jelly from his beard. It would seem this rather simple routine (beard-cleaning, not the jelly part) has a mollifying effect. Contentment in rote. Travok also takes some comfort in the confines of the environment. Even with all of the dangers that seem to be lurking, the feeling underground is so much more... insular. With ears still attuned to the echoes of caves, safety seems easier to ensure. There is no sky for the sounds of approaching beings to get lost in. Everything reverberates off the walls. Including the crackling of Bibbglesby's fire. And the shadows from it.

Primary Check - Perception: 33

Those shadows are too big. The light and warmth are sure to be welcome to the others, but Travok bristles a bit with that bright of a source in these confines. This isn't the outdoors! Carefully masking the flame behind a rock barrier, he protects his companions from the bright-light beacon effect while still letting them find solace in the fire.

Secondary Check - Dungeoneering: 24

There. That's better. Travok moves back to the dark side of the fire barrier and curls comfortably onto the rock floor.

{Sometimes communicating via email can remove the spontaneity of an interaction - think of every message you've received on a dating website EVER - but in this case my players do a great job of spring-boarding off each other's ideas.}

Email Skill Challenge II: A Night In The Caves

Here's my latest email skill challenge for the Blingdenstone adventure. Please see my previous post about how this works. If I get permission from my players, I'll post their responses in the comments!

Your battle-weary party has chosen to take an extended rest in the caverns surrounding Blingdenstone. Luckily you possess the Exodus Knife, which allows you to cut a doorway into your own little pocket dimension (no need for guard shifts). However, the hazards that lay behind and before you leave your party somewhat agitated. When this happened in the past you had Kismet's Song of Rest to lull you to sleep - but now the only sounds you can hear are the dripping of water off stalactites and the skittering of various cave-dwelling creatures. You feel as if the cold, damp air of the caverns has seeped into your bones, and whenever you are not actively using a light source your eyes struggle to adjust to the otherworldly darkness. This may turn out to be a restless night for you all...

Dread Night Vale Secret Identities

Everyone in Night Vale has secrets. So I thought it was only fair to give my Dread players secrets of their own to match the setting. Just like any one character question, they could use these to try to avoid pulls. I also encouraged them to use these to obtain equipment in the early stage of the game. For example, it made sense for the member of the NRA wanted a rifle, s/he would have easy access to one (a single pull) rather than another character who might have to get around pesky things like a background check and a three-day waiting period (two pulls). Characters might even choose to reveal their secrets to their teammates, if doing so might advance the plot.

Background: Your secret identity is just something you don’t necessarily talk to about with strangers or casual acquaintances, for whatever reason. This is not something that you must keep secret - in fact, you will likely want to reveal your secret at one point or another, in order to gain a bonus in gameplay. If you wish, one or more of your team members can be aware of your “secret.”

Ex-CIA agent. You received a letter from a Night Vale resident, a former colleague who was burned for his theories about a “World Government.” Your colleague urged you to come here to help with his/her investigation of “the black helicopters.”

Member of the NRA. You attended the local chapter meeting the other day and were handed a bumper sticker that says, “Guns don’t kill people. It’s impossible to be killed by a gun. We are all invincible to bullets and it’s a miracle.”

Scout. You are a proud son/daughter of the White Mountain Apache Tribe, on your mother’s side. Your grandfather taught you everything he knew about being a scout. There is apparently some white guy in Night Vale who calls himself “The Apache Tracker,” but who knows what that’s about.

Eagle Scout. You wanted to get involved with the local chapter of the Boy Scouts. They do things differently here in Night Vale… for one, signup is automatic and random; families receive a scarlet envelope informing them their sons have been selected.

Connected. When you left your mobster family to become a scientist, you never dreamed that you would run into your Uncle Rico again. He owns the only local pizza shop that hasn’t been burned down in an unsolved arson case…

Related. You are the third cousin twice removed of John Peters - you know, the farmer. He has no children, and is hoping you’ll move to Night Vale and take over the farm someday.

Ready-to-steal Dread characters (Night Vale)

My second Night Vale Dread game got cancelled - no one showed up just because a catastrophic snow storm was descending upon us. Freaking casuals. However! That's no reason not to share my revised character questionnaires with my adoring public. 

In Dread, the host (GM) creates a unique character questionnaire for each character. The answers players provide help dictate their role-playing choices and can sometimes be used to help them avoid pulls. For example, say you come across a locked door. A character might be asked to pull to try to pick the lock. But if you put in your backstory that you spent time in prison for B&E, you might not have to pull to get through. Creating questionnaires is more art than science... and I am still trying to perfect my form. For the purpose of the one-shot pickup games I run at my FLGS, I usually limit my questionnaires to 6-7 questions, whereas a typical Dread questionnaire is about a dozen questions long. I also added a twist with "Secret Identities," which tied the characters to the Night Vale community in some way. I'll include those in a separate post.

Oooh, mysterious! 

Background: You are members of a research team that has come to figure out just what is going on in Night Vale, the most scientifically interesting community in the United States. For example… seismic monitors indicate that catastrophic earthquakes are happening, but no one feels anything. An elderly woman named Josie claims that Angels visit her on a regular basis, and help out with household chores. The sun doesn’t set at the correct time, and indeed it seems that none of the clocks from Night Vale actually work. A few weeks ago, a strange glowing cloud appeared above the city, dropping dead animals of increasing size. Then it disappeared without a trace, and any digital recordings of it were also wiped clean. Then there’s Hiram McDaniels, a five-headed dragon, approximately 18 feet tall, with mostly green eyes, and weighing about 3600 pounds… he’s wanted by the Sheriff’s office, under suspicion of insurance fraud. And just the other day, all books stopped working - when you tried to read them, they started emitting sparks and, somehow, biting. These are just some of the mysteries you have come to Night Vale to investigate. But you all have your own secrets as well…

By the way, I modeled each of these after a famous scientist character. See if you can guess which one is which!

Another comic post - real original content coming soon...

(via Dorkly)

Bwahahahaha

(via Completely Serious Comics)

Dread: Welcome to Night Vale

Lately I've been obsessed with the Welcome to Night Vale podcast, and it occurred to me that it would make the perfect setting for Dread. I got to steal a lot of flavor text, in italics below, from the show itself (specifically the episode "Pyramid"). I also recommended that each player listen to a few episodes if they hadn't already, so they could get a general idea of the background and tone. I'm still working on getting the characters right for this game, but I'm planning to post those later.

The System: Dread is a role-playing game that uses Jenga® instead of dice. Pull from the tower and you succeed. Refuse to pull and you fail. The choice is yours. But if the tower falls, your character will be eliminated from the game!

The Setting: "Welcome to Night Vale is a twice-monthly podcast in the style of community updates for the small desert town of Night Vale, featuring local weather, news, announcements from the Sheriff's Secret Police, mysterious lights in the night sky, dark hooded figures with unknowable powers, and cultural events. Turn on your radio and hide." 

School Daze: BtVS (Characters)

You may think that we GMs pour over rule books to get a complete understanding of game mechanics, then turn to our computer screens and effortlessly produce a compelling interactive story line. What actually happens, at least for me, is that I discover a gaming system that sounds intriguing, check out the rules and some of the sample flavor text, then hit the internet to see if someone has done the hard work for me. It's usually only when I've seen a game in action that I commit the necessary resources to creating a game "from scratch."

That being said, this post is for all my fellow lazy GMs who want to run the BtVS School Daze game I posted previously, and just need the characters. I will say, though, that character creation in School Daze is incredibly easy - you just pick each student's Favorite Subject (+2 to related rolls) and three Ranks (+/-1 to related rolls). Then you add Relationships to NPCs - which is super easy when you're working off an established cannon like BtVS - and a Motivation. I actually left the Motivations blank, so my players could tell me what was on the forefront of their character's mind that week. These characters are set in the early seasons of BtVS, when they were actually in high school, but you can easily adapt them for later seasons as desired. 

One more note... because of my OCD desire for a balanced party, I made sure there were not repeats in Ranks. This is obviously not necessary and may actually not be completely true to the original characters. If verisimilitude is your thing, modify these as needed. Or let your players customize their characters by swapping out a Rank or two, if they can explain to you why a different Rank would be a better fit for their character. And no, "this would be more useful" is not a good explanation.

Ready-to-steal School Daze characters after the jump!

School Daze: BtVS

Hey, friends - here's my latest contribution to Wednesday Night RPGs at my FLGS. It's a game of School Daze set in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer universe. Some of this was borrowed from the BtVS RPG. Check out the bottom of the post for my Playtest Notes.

The System: School Daze is a role-playing game in a high school setting. High school is an exciting time. Everything in your life is in flux, and no matter what, nothing will be the same again. What better place to set a story? Each player takes on the role of a high school student, with all of their hopes, dreams, problems, and challenges. The Administrator facilitates the game using Group Projects as frameworks for the game sessions. School Daze is collaborative and functions best when the Students and the Administrator work together, developing the story and the world together.

The Setting: Buffy the Vampire Slayer follows Buffy Summers, the latest in a line of young women known as Vampire Slayers. Slayers are chosen by fate to battle against vampires, demons, and other forces of darkness. Like previous Slayers, Buffy is aided by a Watcher, who guides, teaches, and trains her. Unlike her predecessors, Buffy surrounds herself with a circle of loyal friends who become known as the "Scooby Gang".

This totally counts as a post.

Existential Dread

Anyone who loves story-driven games and experiences mounting terror while playing Jenga will love Dread, my new favorite gaming system. I have written a couple of games for Dread at this point, and I thought some of them might be good enough to share with y'all.

Attempt Number One: Marvelous Marvin's Circulating Circus. This plot was a bit too railroaded - the actual game play didn't go anything like I planned. The character questionnaires were modified (*cough*stolen*cough) from ones posted online, so I can't really take any credit for them.

Happy New Blog Post

Holy mother of pearl it's been a long time! But never fear, fair reader (all one of you) - I have resolved this New Year to continue sharing my genius with the world. Behold! A post!

As I may have mentioned before, I share GMing responsibilities for one my home campaigns with my best frenemy, Mac. The problem is, he raises the bar on story-telling to ridiculous levels. He even started up a new form of skill challenge via email, compatible with 4E but without the pesky disincentive to participate that is the success/failure system. Check out previous posts for details. Here is my first attempt at doing something similar!