A couple of weeks ago I had a rather unfortunate run in with a below-average GM and PUG (Pick Up Game).
My flatmate had come around with a GM friend of his and a couple of kids (One aged more than 18, still acted like a kid, and another 13 who was a kid) on proposition of a PUG. I agreed and said friend GM nearly instantly said “I’ll run!” since he had an idea for a scenario. The question of system came up and he threw 3.5 into the air and I didn’t object since no one else did and I was kinda itching for a game.
What followed was thus:
- (1 hour) Chargen using the SRD to create skeletons of characters without much value in any kind of D&D 3.5 way.
- (2.5 hours) Play which failed to utilize any of the 3.5 rules, apart from those that nitpick, like casting times, spells per day and what’s the bonus we have for skills we didn’t allocate points for.
Understandably, I think, this was embarrassing. Primarily for me.
Here I was, someone who has a clear image of what a good GM looks like, and this guy, whom my flatmate says is a great GM, does a shite job.
He stifles ideas and forces rules and static play instead of going with the flow and rolling with ideas.
I left mid-game. I will not speak about how lousy the players were, but they were.
After the game, I invested around 10 minutes of thought into how one could handle a game on the fly, using a system that has useful bare bones and an easy resolution mechanic.
From that thought was born InstaRPG.
It currently has a G+ post of the first iteration as a concept, a Google Doc outlining the basic rules and a WIP Google Doc extending the rules. Below are the links.
Feel free to use the basic rules 🙂
The second topic I have is Legend of Grimrock (Website).
Legend of Grimrock is an old school type dungeon crawler in the vein of Eye of the Beholder. It’s got great gameplay and pretty awesome puzzles. Hack & Slash (Post) can probably do a considerably better job at impressing the game upon you.
I’ve been playing it late, for hours at a time when it came out, and less so lately seeing as I had less time to myself.
However, I had looked in the folder for an update thing, to update it automatically, and found 3 pdf files that made the game awesomer and gave me ideas.
The first file was graph paper you could print to have relevant looking maps when playing in Old-School Mode (sans auto-mapping); The second file was the manual, which had insights about the setting and 3 pages of well written fluff; The third file, however, takes the cake – Grimrock happens inside Mount Grimrock and very little is given to us about the outside world – and there the file gives us a complete, old-school looking map that details the entire region related to Grimrock! It come complete with locations, kingdoms, notable landmarks and enough room for an amazing sandbox!
So, following the discovery, I’ve resolved to try and run something Grimrock inspired, using the races the game supplies, with what little description it does about them, and see where the winds take me (and the party that will be playing this game).
If anyone would like to contribute in helping me flesh out the setting the map has, I would appreciate it. I can be contacted via G+, which also has my Email. My profile can be reached here.
Myself, signing out.