Tag Archives: brainstorming

YAOSC: Opposition Tracks

Posted on May 6, 2019 by Confanity

Setting sail from Alexandria Once again, I was reading someone else’s thoughts on tabletop RPGs when I was inspired to riff on one of the ideas to my own ends. In this case, it was Justin Alexander’s “Stealthy Thoughts,” and … Continue reading →

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Challenge Accepted: The Museum Experience

Posted on December 10, 2018 by Confanity

Once again I’ve found inspiration in a passing comment on someone’s blog; in this case the source is a list of movies the writer found inspiring (for their tabletop RPG play), and the comment is in response to Indiana Jones and … Continue reading →

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Campaign idea: Medusa’s Vault

Posted on December 18, 2017 by Confanity

I was talking with some gaming friends the other day and we got onto the topic of people being turned to stone (e.g. by a Medusa-type monster) and then back again (e.g. by a Stone to Flesh type spell). We agreed … Continue reading →

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Campaign Idea: The Worst Year

Posted on December 13, 2016 by Confanity

Inspired by this Reddit post. For best effect, keep a record or campaign journal… but keep it hidden from the players. (At least until it’s all over.) Start a campaign normally in the late summer or autumn, but in a relatively … Continue reading →

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Just the right number of cooks?

Posted on April 3, 2016 by Confanity

三人寄れば文殊の知恵 (Sannin yoreba Monju no chie; “If three people gather, the wisdom of Manjusri”) Definition: Two (or more!) heads are better than one. When ordinary people consider an issue together as a group, they can produce more great ideas than … Continue reading →

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Things to do with “spell slots”

Posted on November 7, 2015 by Confanity

A while back I read and commented on a post at Ten Foot Polemic. Mr. Young had an interesting idea about allowing clerics to create “talismans” (I keep on feeling like the plural should be “talismen,” but that’s silly) to … Continue reading →

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Magic Monday – opening thoughts

Posted on March 2, 2015 by Confanity

So my current “fantasy heartbreaker” is YAOSC. As a grad student with a baby, I don’t have time to do more than take it out and putter around with it a little every now and then. But recently* this post at … Continue reading →

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Fiddling with XP, part 2: Something old, something new

Posted on July 11, 2014 by Confanity

Previously I rambled for a while about XP systems, and how my ideal would be granular and world-associated – i.e. the way it works makes sense from an in-world perspective as well as a meta, mechanical one. Assuming a D&D-style … Continue reading →

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More Musings on Skill Points and Economies Thereof

Posted on December 23, 2013 by Confanity

When I think about pen-and-paper RPG design, I invariably come around to skill systems and skill points. One thing that strikes me as odd about D&D is the almost complete disconnect between the systems for combat and the systems for … Continue reading →

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An SP Economy

Posted on November 27, 2013 by Confanity

(Yes, there are some bloggers who have talked about replacing the venerable “gold piece”-centric currency system with a silver standard, but that’s not what this post is about.) (By the by, I’m in favor of world-specific, idiosyncratic currency systems. It … Continue reading →

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