Tag: TTRPG

Thac0 with Advantage 47. Workshopping Vecna. Eve of Ruin

Thac0 with Advantage 47. Workshopping Vecna. Eve of Ruin

Posted on by Christopher Sniezak

Welcome to THAC0 . . . with Advantage! We’re two friends that have been playing D&D a long time. While we both love lots of other RPGs, the multiverse may come unraveled if we don’t play D&D.

Published adventures are often juggling a lot of objectives. The adventure may be trying to illustrate a specific style of campaign, it may be highlighting a certain type of creature or opponent. And sometimes, it may be trying to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons. In this episode, we’re going to look at Vecna: Eve of Ruin, and see what kind of fine tuning you might want to explore when engaging with this plane hopping epic adventure.

Thac0 with Advantage 46. Far From Home: Adventuring on Other Planes

Thac0 with Advantage 46. Far From Home: Adventuring on Other Planes

Posted on by Christopher Sniezak

Welcome to THAC0 . . . with Advantage! We’re two friends that have been playing D&D a long time. While we both love lots of other RPGs, D&D is coterminous to our gaming reality.

Fantasy stories abound with places beyond the mortal realms. Fae domains, magical islands outside of time, and the lands of the dead, among others. How can you instill this kind of otherworldly adventure into your game? How do you make a realm outside of mortal existence feel different, memorable, and distinct? What are some of the pitfalls of taking your mortal adventurers and placing them beyond? We’re going to example these questions in today’s episode, as we pass beyond the veil.

Thac0 with Advantage 45. A Valiant Effort to Look at a New Game

Thac0 with Advantage 45. A Valiant Effort to Look at a New Game

Posted on by Christopher Sniezak

Welcome to THAC0 . . . with Advantage! We’re two friends that have been playing D&D a long time. While we both love lots of other RPGs, a whole lot of them have a family resemblance to D&D.

In 2008, Wizards of the Coast released the extremely restrictive GSL, making it unattractive to develop for the 4th edition of the game, which led to the creation of Pathfinder, a game that effectively allowed gamers to continue using the familiar structure of D&D 3rd edition in a familiar fantasy roleplaying game. In 2023, Wizards of the Coast attempted to assert that they could revoke the OGL and issue an amended one that gave them more control over creators, which resulted in a lot of creators building their own games. Today, we’re looking at one of those games, Tales of the Valiant, built on the Black Flag System Reference.

Thac0 with Advantage 44. Pulling Encounters out of your Bag of Holding

Thac0 with Advantage 44. Pulling Encounters out of your Bag of Holding

Posted on by Christopher Sniezak

Welcome to THAC0 . . . with Advantage! We’re two friends that have been playing D&D a long time. While we both love lots of other RPGs, D&D keeps coming up on the random encounter charts.

What happens when player characters come in contact with non-player characters? That interaction in D&D is called an encounter, and its where much of the game takes place. Some encounters happen in a set place in time, some happen at random, and some emerge from play. With all of this variability and versatility, what’s the best way to make encounters sing? We’ll take a look at that on today’s THAC0 with Advantage.

Thac0 with Advantage 43. Running the Same Adventure Again

Thac0 with Advantage 43. Running the Same Adventure Again

Posted on by Christopher Sniezak

Welcome to THAC0 . . . with Advantage! We’re two friends that have been playing D&D a long time. While we both love lots of other RPGs, D&D has cast a temporal loop spell over us that we can’t escape.

There are a thousand stories you can tell with Dungeons & Dragons, but what if you really want to tell the same story more than once? Because roleplaying games present players with so many choices, sometimes it can be fascinating to go back and see if your current players will take the road less traveled, or if some mistakes are built to last. We’re going to explore running the same adventure more than once, and how to get the most out of the experience.

Thac0 with Advantage 42. Magic and Technology, I come from a place where they are one and the same!

Thac0 with Advantage 42. Magic and Technology, I come from a place where they are one and the same!

Posted on by Christopher Sniezak

Welcome to THAC0 . . . with Advantage! We’re two friends that have been playing D&D a long time. While we both love lots of other RPGs, D&D is the recursive program that we’re still running to solve for a perfect campaign.

In some fantasy stories, everything is steeped in myth and magic, and anything that distracts from those themes detracts from the story. But that’s not every fantasy story. For decades, pulp heroes could just as easily wield a sword as a laser pistol. Sometimes it’s worth it to see the looks on your player’s faces when the dragon they’ve been hunting is actually a cyborg with laser vision. Today we’re going to talk about when and how to include science fiction in your D&D campaigns

Thac0 with Advantage 41. Who Goes First? Rolling for Initiative

Thac0 with Advantage 41. Who Goes First? Rolling for Initiative

Posted on by Christopher Sniezak

Welcome to THAC0 . . . with Advantage! We’re two friends that have been playing D&D a long time. While we both love lots of other RPGs, D&D still acts first in all of our rounds of gaming.

Imagine a table full of gamers. Each one of them has a character with multiple options available to them. Now think of all of those characters in the same scene with a giants, a dragon, and a band of ogres. How do you keep all of those characters straight and make sure that everyone gets to take their turn? We roll for initiative, and let the dice tell us who gets to take what turn and when. We’ll explore how 5e D&D works, as well as variations that exist in the game.

BXP 6x11 - Monica and Heather Consider Ways to Keep Players Playing

BXP 6×11 – Monica and Heather Consider Ways to Keep Players Playing

Posted on by Senda Linaugh

Today Monica gets together with Heather (her wife) to discuss one of their mutually shared core principles of game design: participation makes the game. If you remove players from play, you are denying them the chance to experience your game. We break down what this means as well as provide good and bad examples of designing for character creation, incapacitation, elimination, and replacement. We also discuss constructive self-entertainment vs. disruptive behavior and techniques for different designs and different styles of play. 

BXP 6x10 - Monica and Alex Break Down Setting Design Using Video Games

BXP 6×10 – Monica and Alex Break Down Setting Design Using Video Games

Posted on by Senda Linaugh

Today I’m joined by friend and colleague Alex Guerrero to discuss how video games utilize narrative and setting design to create a sense of wonder and mystery – and how you can bring that to the table in your own tabletop RPGs!

BXP 6x09 Monica and D Evaluate Rules Exceptions

BXP 6×09 Monica and D Evaluate Rules Exceptions

Posted on by Senda Linaugh

D is back in the studio with me today to deliver on our promise to discuss exceptions-based rules design. We talk about Exalted: Essence an awful lot, but also talk about Malifaux, Chronicles of Darkness, and some upcoming games. We talk about good examples of how to build strong exceptions and an equal number of bad ones, and point out games that don’t do this at all.