Breakout 2018 Convention Debrief (Part Three)

Day three! The final, bleary-eyed day of the con! (If you missed the first two parts, you can find them here and here.)

After a late night of horror playing BLUEBEARD'S BRIDE, we were ready for something a little lighter, and luckily, we had just the game. We were lucky enough to have Epidiah Ravachol on hand to run a traditional Sunday morning game of SWORDS WITHOUT MASTER, his very clever swords-and-sorcery storytelling game.

Breakout 2018 Convention Debrief (Part Two)

Today I'm writing about our big day Saturday at Breakout. (If you missed Part One, it's here.)

I didn't get a great night's sleep on Friday, which is pretty normal for me in a strange bed, but especially after a day of great games. I had the momentum from playing ROSENSTRASSE to carry me through the low-energy bits.

Breakout 2018 Convention Debrief (Part One)

It's been a while since I've written in these pages regularly, but every once in a while you just have to gush a bit about something awesome. In this case, it's our second trip to Breakout, a gaming convention in Toronto.

We had a really great time with our first visit to Breakout, where we got to play great games with wonderful designers and enthusiastic players, so our expectations were high going into this year's con. Megan said she was trying not to get her hopes too high, in case it wasn't quite as good, but we were both delighted to find that this year's convention was better than ever. Two of the organizers warmly welcomed us with a hug in the first few minutes we were there, taking in the swanky new digs in the Sheraton Toronto. That kind of warm atmosphere was what we loved about Breakout 2017, and this year's model was the same thing in a bigger space.

Welcome to Prepville! Population: YOU

Shout out to Alex, who suggested this topic. Thanks Alex! I don't know how I've been writing this blog for several years and not directly addressed the topic of prep, but it's a huge one.

We started chatting about prep because I was talking about having just finished preparing for the first session of the new game I'm about to start running, MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH. It's a big change of gears after wrapping up NO ONE GETS OUT ALIVE, which was a small-cast, high drama affair. MRD is a more traditional game, running on a traditional (even retro, in a lot of ways) rule system, with a lot more demands on the GM side of things.

I think the two games will provide fruitful points of comparison in terms of what was required to prepare for both of them.

Maybe We Haunt Ourselves: NO ONE GETS OUT ALIVE

Strathclyde House. Whatever walked there, walked alone.

Last week, we finished my haunted house campaign NO ONE GETS OUT ALIVE. It was a strong finish to a game that had a lot of powerful stuff in it.

Everything about this game was an experiment, really, and it's probably lucky that it came out as well as it did, but I had great players and good tools to play with. The objective of the game was to play something that was focused on going deeper, playing harder than we had for a while, even in games that had a lot of good stuff in them. We were playing with a slightly smaller group, three players and a GM, which had important implications for play down the line. As far as mechanics go, we were using the dramatic petitioner-granter rules from DRAMASYSTEM, with the 2d6+Trait mechanic from Powered-by-the-Apocalypse games to serve as our procedural rules.

Review Omnibus

August's flurry of RPGaDay activity has me wanting to post material more often, so I thought I would re-share some older material that might still be of general interest. Today, here's a collection of game reviews I've written in the last couple of years for some pretty awesome games. Maybe you're still thinking about buying them...? Read on.

Bittersweet Farewell to #RPGaDay2017

31. What do you anticipate most for gaming in 2018?

I have to echo Rob Donoghue -- I'm looking forward to DUSK CITY OUTLAWS and SHADOW OF THE CENTURY a lot. I'm also looking forward to seeing what the revised edition of STARS WITHOUT NUMBER looks like.

But, to be honest, I'm also looking forward to catching up on a couple of 2017 games I haven't got my hot little hands on yet -- DRESDEN FILES ACCELERATED and BLADES IN THE DARK are definite must-gets for me, when I've got the cash. And I'm looking forward to getting some play time with a few games I've Kickstarted, especially THE WATCH. And if I'm very brave, maybe I'll get a chance to play BLUEBEARD'S BRIDE.