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29 novembre 2017

Mesdames et Messieurs, l'inarrêtable John Grümph !

Mesdames et Messieurs, l'inarrêtable John Grümph !

Originally shared by John Grümph

Il y a longtemps que je bosse (et que je joue) sur une adaptation fort personnelle des mécaniques de base de Rêve de Dragon. Ce n'est plus du tout pour jouer dans cet univers très particulier, mais plutôt pour motoriser des univers maison pour lesquels je cherche à la fois un peu d'héroïsme et un peu de dureté réaliste. Je trouve que l'architecture des persos est bien foutue pour ce juste milieu.
Et donc, en bref, ça se trouve sur mon site : http://legrumph.org/Terrier/?Jeux-de-role/Draconis
Vous pouvez l'imprimer en recto verso et le plier en A7 pour le ranger dans une poche...

27 novembre 2017

₲д₥€$ Wo₹₭$hop (autant pousser le troll jusqu'au bout, et puis juste des $ et des € c'est un peu discriminatoire,...


₲д₥€$ Wo₹₭$hop (autant pousser le troll jusqu'au bout, et puis juste des $ et des € c'est un peu discriminatoire, non ?) avait éveillé mon intérêt avec une résurrection de Necromunda, malgré mes autodirectives anti nouvstalgie.

Heureusement, je pouvais compter sur eux pour se disqualifier. Petite comparaison des jeux entre '95 (on écrivait pas les centaines et les milliers d'années, tu vois, à l'époque on vivait vraiment l'instant présent - carpe saeculum, quoi) et 2017. Apparemment les règles sont toujours dans le même style Games Workshopien. Le matériel est, factuellement, beaucoup plus beau qu'il y a 20 ans. Vraiment. Par contre, passer du jeu résolument tridimensionnel à placement libre dans un décor chaotique qui faisait pour moi l'essentiel de son génial gameplay à un bien sage plateau à cases et à plat :'( c'est d'un triiiiiste. Au revoir GW, merci d'avoir joué avec moi.
Title

Two sides of that fence.

Two sides of that fence.

Originally shared by Jesse Burneko

Forgive me a flippant pet peeve indulgence:

This is a quote from a Cthulhu Dark review: " It envisions that Cthulhu Dark scenarios will be designed and run in a very specific way by the Keeper (despite much of this not actually being especially enforced by the game rules), and proclaims these requirements as dictats from the designer. This is something which inevitably gets my back up because in an RPG refereeing context I hate feeling like a game designer is trying to run the game for me"

I'm sorry, but this is literally why I am buying a game. I'm paying the game designer to tell me how to run their game. I am turned off if this is NOT present in an RPG.

Yes, designer, please tell me how to run your game. I can run my own games just fine. But I am not so arrogant as to believe that my "style" is all encompassing and perfect. I'm hear to listen and learn how to run YOUR game.

Thank you, game designer, for your time and instruction.

25 novembre 2017

“I’m so pissed.

Originally shared by Alan De Smet

“I’m so pissed. Bob’s Wing Joint gave the atomic hot wings, when I ordered barbecue. I called them up to complain, and Bob insisted that I ordered atomic hot. I don’t care how good their wings are, they can’t be trusted!”

“Woah, woah, woah, what happened to innocent until proven guilty?”

“This is the second time they’ve done this to me, so I’m pretty sure.”

“Maybe it’s just misunderstanding. You might not have been clear about what you wanted, and Bob just tried to give you want he thought you wanted.”

“‘Barbecue’ and ‘atomic hot’ don’t really sound alike. But this isn’t the first time this happened, so I carefully enunciated and said it twice.”

“Did you really order barbecue? Isn’t it possible that you ordered the atomic hot, then had regrets on your way here? So are you lying to cover up a decision you regret?”

“...”

“Besides, how can I trust you at all? People make bad reviews of restaurants all the time because they’re out to ruin the restaurant’s reputation, or trying to blackmail the restaurant.”

“Seriously?”

“Do you have any evidence that you ordered barbecue wings?”

“I placed the order on the phone, and the receipt is just an indecipherable scrawl, so not really.”

“Well, Bob says you ordered it, and you say you didn’t, so without some sort of concrete evidence, I’ll just have to remain neutral. It’s the logical thing to do.”

24 novembre 2017

Deux paradoxes amusants de la Cellule.

Deux paradoxes amusants de la Cellule.

- Sens, un jeu où les seuls personnages non déterminés de l'univers vont suivre un script.

- Les jdr anarchistes sont des jdr qui placent les règles au-dessus de toutes les joueuses.

22 novembre 2017

Totally!


Totally!

Originally shared by Paul Beakley

Family Values

Because it’s Thanksgiving weekend, here’s an essay on a topic I’ve been thinking about a while.

Maybe the single biggest event in my life that has shaped how and why I play RPGs was becoming a parent. It is a life changing event, and given how big a part of my life tabletop games are, it was inevitable.

What being a parent has brought to my play is an acute awareness of the presence and absence of children in a game: the world, the setting, the situation.

The first time I ran Sagas of the Icelanders, I decided to just litter the community with kids. Any given household with a man and a woman, I’d ask or propose something like “so how many kids, then? Say between three and eight?” And if there was pushback, like they went below three, I’d follow up with something leading like, “So what do folks think is wrong? What’s the gossip? What are you doing to change that?” Stuff like that. And then on my big crazy relationship situation map, every homestead would have lots of little circles for every kid. They’d outnumber adult characters 3:1 or more.

On the flip side, playing a SotI game sans kids would feel weird and empty to me. Did everyone just arrive? Did some fever kill all the kids? How many women are pregnant now and when are they due? I’d try to fill that gap hard with something, anything.

Slip over to a more traditional fantasy game and that awareness is still there. In our Torchbearer game, the party was underground for, what, four sessions? Five? Lots. And of course, they’re on the job in a very dangerous place. So when they finally crawl out with their meager loot and limp into the crossroads town, kids everywhere. It’s a jarring and important division between their day job life and real life.

The world is full of kids. It’s how we keep going. I’m not even talking about het couples, here, although I have a blind spot I’m working on regarding non-het relationships that are, you know, just part of the background. And if they have kids in their families, well, that brings up interesting questions in any setting. Anyway! Not the point of this. I’m just talking about including children if you have even the faintest hope of creating a world that feels real and lived in.

I’ve sat at and listened in on puh-lenty of traditional fantasy tables, largely before I was a parent. And it didn’t seem weird at all to have a town populated only by adult professionals (blacksmith, tavern owner, The Mayor, guards, barmaid, whatever) and a total absence of even the tiniest hint of family life. Or what about mission-oriented futuristic stuff? Pull into the starport in a Traveller game and head over to the bar/jobs board/TAS, no kids to be seen anywhere.

Unless of course they’re a plot device.

I’m not sure what the child-equivalent trope is to fridging but fuuuuck it happens, doesn’t it? The wizard’s minions have murdered your unnamed, faceless children and now you seek vengeance. Or the dumb Fallout thing: your kid has been kidnapped, and now you wander around doing stuff for what feels like years that has little or nothing to do with finding your child. I can tell you, as a parent, I would not be building communities and assembling sweet powered armor.

So it seems to me like gaming settings are divided between carefree child-less free agents (frequently single as well), and messy, real worlds where kids exist and are important. You kind of see it in genre media as well. The slave community in Stargate is filled with children, giving Ra’s child attendants a chilling vibe. Star Wars: A New Hope has zero children at all, making Mos Eisley a very traditional fantasy town. But obviously family life is important in Rogue One, and additional kids run around in the background on Jedha, making it feel like a living community. Mostly kids are just imperiled by super showdowns in Marvel and DC movies, but at least they’re there (the near-total absence of family life in most supers stories is a whole different topic, and it’s why The Incredibles is maybe one of the finest supers stories ever told).

The GM who creates a world without children is like the player who creates the orphaned loner.

Some thoughts on where and how to add kids, particularly if you’re not a parent:

* If you want settings that feel vibrant and real, there will be children present. Fantasy settings especially should feature energetic children of any age that can walk literally underfoot anywhere and everywhere. Sci-fi settings of course have kids too, although they might be less present in professional settings. But there are still families. NPCs know and love people.

* Don’t make child endangerment a go-to plot tool. It’s lazy and gross. But don’t ignore the fact that damned near any parent will be irrationally protective of their offspring, PC and NPC alike. Kids are not ever “acceptable losses” in anyone’s cold calculations.

* Children are not stupid, but they are terrible at risk assessment.

* Kids have their own social networks as well, and will be just as loyal to their circle as they are to their own families. This just escalates with age.

* Look at including a variety of ages. Newborns are a huge pain in the ass, but at least they’re immobile. Pre-tweens are both super-mobile and exceptionally poor at risk assessment. Teens want to act like adults but lack most of what they need to be independent (other than the will).

* All kids are impressionable by every adult they come in contact with.

Have a nice Thanksgiving weekend.

Children's Games
Painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1560

15 novembre 2017

I don’t very much like how stat highlights and XP work in AW, so I am often thinking about other way of doing things...


I don’t very much like how stat highlights and XP work in AW, so I am often thinking about other way of doing things (short of simply removing highlights, XP and advancement). I am always breaking 2E’s Seduce or Manipulate Someone move :(

Anyway, here is one way :

IMPROVEMENT
Whenever another player character maneuvers to put you in an ideal position to roll a highlighted, and you do, tell them to mark an experience circle. Whenever you reset your Hx with someone, mark an experience circle.


Here is another way:

IMPROVEMENT
Forget about highlighted stats. At the start of the session, hold 2. Anytime, you can spend 1 to change a 6- roll to a 7-9 or a 7-9 to a 10+. (No, you don’t get to step up to 12+ this way, nice try.) At the session end, spend each you still hold to mark an experience circle.

Miam !

Miam !

Originally shared by Radio Rôliste

Nouvel épisode ! Au programme : Jouer des parties de jeu de rôle, Démiurges et Aquelarre !

http://www.radio-roliste.net/?p=1581
http://www.radio-roliste.net/?p=1581

8 novembre 2017

Invisible Predators and Sad Boys, Finale

Originally shared by Anna Kreider

Invisible Predators and Sad Boys, Finale

This is part three of three. Previous posts also public, modding will be heavy.

Fourth: We can’t speak out, because you can’t even believe us about the obvious predators

The thing that Sad Abusive Boys and serial sexual predators have in common is that they are given permission and plausible deniability by the myth of the socially awkward predator and by the Geek Social Fallacies. And because these serial emotional and sexual abusers are so charming, performatively woke, and socially adept, the odds that they themselves will have high status within the community are high. So the consequences of speaking out against predators who inflict lasting damage are often too high to be borne, because victims know that they will never be believed or supported in any real way.

And how do we know this? We know this because dudes can’t even get it right when women speak out AND HAVE PROOF. Jessica Schmidt had SCREENSHOTS of her interactions with Frank Mentzer, and was accused of faking the accusations for attention - despite the fact that she’s no longer even working in the games industry.

And we know this because women who have tried to speak up in the wake of #metoo about serial emotional abusers have been similarly stonewalled, disbelieved, and blamed for their own abuse. When other female developers have tried to speak out against serial emotional believers like John Morke, some of them (like Jacqueline Bryk) have been lucky enough to be believed. But others haven’t.

So this is why women and femmes don’t speak out about abuse. Because dudes, you can’t even get it right when you’re playing on the lowest difficulty setting. If you can’t get the response right when you are presented with OBVIOUS MONSTER HERE ARE SCREENSHOTS AND OTHER PROOF, women sure as shit aren’t going to trust you to get it right on a higher difficulty like “your best friend groped me” or “your business partner is a serial emotional abuser”.

This is it, because I don’t have the energy for a conclusion that ties it all together and makes it sound less angry

Invisible Predators and Sad Boys, Continued

Originally shared by Anna Kreider

Invisible Predators and Sad Boys, Continued

This post is continued from my previous post. Again, this post will be modded with an iron fist.

Second: Sad Boys who make us Save them

At Metatopia, I was lucky enough to play Jenn Martin's Manic Pixie Dream Girls Anonymous (who G+ still won't let me tag???), a serious LARP about a support group for MPDGs who want to learn to stop shrinking their dreams and sacrificing their desires and aspirations in order to support their Sad Boy. In the game, any of this behavior is referred to as “Saving the Boy”, and the structure of the game supports the MPDGs in learning to accept that they are real, whole people and that the role of MPDG that has been imposed on them is dehumanizing and unjust.

This game was hugely emotionally resonant for me, because it gave language to the fact that I have been made a MPDG by Sad Boys before, and that it was a denial of my humanity. It also helped me reclaim some of my humanity from the fact that I am wrestling with a particular Sad Boy in my life right now. And that it is hard and difficult and agonizing learning to assert boundaries around your basic humanity when you know that your Sad Boy won’t tolerate this. Just because you know a relationship has become deeply toxic doesn’t mean you can just turn off those feelings. And when female socialization means that the only scripts you’ve internalized are scripts that force you to accept your lot as your Sad Boy’s MPDG? Removing that toxic influence from your life means fighting your own brain as well.

And friends? Sad Boys are so, so common. Our community is rife with Sad Boys - which is part of the reason why the response to Manic Pixie Dream Girls Anonymous and games like it is so, so fucking strong and why it practically went viral at Metatopia.

Third: Some Sad Boys are skilled emotional predators

SOME Sad Boys are just that. Sad Boys who don’t know how to do their own goddamn emotional labor and need women/femmes to prop up their sense of self worth, since that’s how society has trained them. And that fucking sucks, and the fact that they don’t MEAN to be harmful doesn’t change the fact that they are. But these Sad Boys are the equivalent of the socially awkward folks who accidentally hurt people from my previous post. They are shitty people, but they’re not SYSTEMATICALLY shitty.

There is, however, a smaller number of Sad Boys who are the emotional equivalent of the sexual predators discussed in my previous post, who use charisma, performative wokeness, and emotionally abusive tactics to get women/femmes to be their Manic Pixie Dream Girls. And these Sad Abusive Boys aren’t just looking for emotional labor and validation; often the Sad Abusive Boys are looking for emotional intimacy with a woman/femme who gives them bonerfeels that they aren’t in a position to act on. And when a woman/femme they have made their MPDG finally asserts boundaries and stands up for herself, the Sad Abusive Boy drops her like a hot rock and moves onto the next MPDG, because they know there’s mostly nothing that the MPDG can say that will seem damning to an outside audience.

Again, Sad Abusive Boys are always THE LAST DUDES YOU WOULD EXPECT, because just like the serial sexual predators they invest heavily in relationships with key community stakeholders. They are performatively woke and make all of the right noises at the right times. There are women/femmes who have only ever had positive interactions with them and are prepared to defend their wokeness too! So the women who are targeted by Sad Abusive Boys are even LESS able to speak up about their Sad Abusive Boys than the women who are targeted by serial sexual predators.

And make no mistake, Sad Abusive Boys ARE abusive, and they are JUST as systematic in selecting the women/femmes that they turn into their MPDGs. Except in this case, they aren’t looking to violate physical boundaries. Rather, they are looking for women with an excess of empathy who take on nurturing or caring roles. They befriend the woman with performative wokeness and expressions of admiration for things that are actually qualities they see mirrored in themselves. And they foster emotional intimacy in ways that make the MPDG they are targeting feel special and wanted. Once they have that intimacy, the Sad Abusive Boy uses and dehumanizes the MPDG to do their emotional labor and to gratify their bonerfeels. The Sad Abusive Boy uses gaslighting, guilt, passive aggression, victim blaming, and sometimes threats of self harm to get targets to go along with this. And this relationship always ends one of two ways:

First, the MPDG finally asserts boundaries and demands respect, which causes the Sad Boy to end the relationship if she sticks with them. However, it’s more likely that he will feign contrition and gaslight the MPDG into not sticking with her demands and accepting further emotional abuse. Which is why the scenario that occurs far more often is that eventually, Sad Abusive Boy’s bonerfeels go away. When this happens, Sad Abusive Boy cuts the now-ex MPDG out of his life and goes in search of a new woman/femme to make his MPDG. And when this happens, it is incredibly, HUGELY traumatic - because the Sad Abusive Boy has been fostering a deeply emotionally abusive relationship and emotional dependency.

I know all of this because it has happened to me at least three times. I lost much of the last year to the emotional devastation wrought by my own Sad Boy. And I’ve seen this story play out with other women too.

(To be continued in one more post)

On Invisible Predators and Sad Boys

Originally shared by Anna Kreider

On Invisible Predators and Sad Boys

Before I get started, I want to be clear that this post isn’t connected to anything that happened to me personally at Metatopia, other than playing Manic Pixie Dream Girls Anonymous and getting SUPER FIRED UP ABOUT THIS. It’s more that I came back and read about shitty things that made me make some connections.

Also, this turned out longer than I expected, so I’m breaking it into a few parts.

First: Invisible predators

What most men don’t understand about the predators in our community is the fact that they are largely invisible, because most serial predators are incredibly socially adept and are very systematic about choosing their targets. The myth of the “socially awkward” predator who “doesn’t mean” to victimize people couldn’t be farther from the truth, in almost all cases; someone who is socially awkward can hurt people unintentionally, but when that happens in 95% of cases, they apologize and attempt to make amends - because most people who are socially awkward are self-aware enough to know that they fuck up and are prepared to deal with that.

REAL predators are an entirely different animal. REAL predators are charming, savvy, and manipulative. Predators will charm the heck out of people in positions of power (men), and make sure to invest heavily in key relationships with community stakeholders who hold a great deal of status. They also have a systematic approach to selecting people to victimize that layers in plausible deniability at every approach, thanks to the myth of the socially awkward predator. They will select someone (usually a woman/femme/nb) who seems vulnerable and test a small boundary. If that meets with no complaint, they will systematically escalate, each time making sure that this boundary-testing is a process that is observed by no one who would think to question it. By the time it gets to sexual assault, often the predator has found a way to violate so many boundaries that the victim gets tied up in “I didn’t say no to all these other boundaries, so I can’t say no to this one” - which is a sinister way of making the victim feel complicit in their abuse and ensuring their silence.

The side effect of this is that because the predator is smart and savvy, because they invest in relationships with key community members, because there are lots of people from the marginalized group they target who the predator has never gone after, the community will be prepared to defend the predator to the ends of the earth, thanks to the cover provided by the myth of the socially awkward predator and because of the Geek Social Fallacies. “He didn’t mean it” or “He’s a good guy” or “I’m a woman and he’s never behaved inappropriately with me”... Etc etc.

I know all of this because it’s exactly what happened to me. It started small, putting his arm around me without asking, then saying “this is okay right”. So many small things that spiraled into things I was desperately not okay with, except I didn’t know how to say no since I hadn’t said no to anything previous. The man who attacked me was a predator. Smart, sophisticated, and devastatingly charming. He’s also progressive and woke, someone no one would suspect. Which is why I’ve never named him, because I know I wouldn’t be believed. Or that his behavior would be excused.

In my particular case, I’m lucky. The man who attacked me stopped going to cons and got lots of therapy. I had enough contact with him to feel secure that he won’t hurt anyone else the way he hurt me. But that’s just one instance.

What men need to know is that the most effective and dangerous predators are also the people YOU WOULD NEVER SUSPECT.

Note: This post is public, as the posts that follow it will also be, but I will mod mercilessly and with an iron fist.

6 novembre 2017

Je me suis toujours demandé si Washington DC était loin de Washington de là-bas..

5 novembre 2017

Yeah, I lied, it wasn't the last Metatopia post.

Originally shared by Rob Donoghue

Yeah, I lied, it wasn't the last Metatopia post.

This one's for the dudes. And lest there be any confusion, I mostly mean the cis-het-white-dudes, but more broadly I mean any dudes who might come across that way.

You have a lot of power.

You do. It's not really a question. Even if it doesn't feel that way sometimes, it's a big stick you're carrying around. And, yeah, it's kind of a sucky sort of power, but not much to do about that.

This isn't really news, but it's important to bring up at Metatopia because part of it being a fantastic opportunity for new designers to reach out to the broader world is that it means it's an opportunity for a lot of designers who don't have that same big stick.

And that matters because these designers are trusting you. They are choosing to expose themselves to the risk of your stick because they trust in your judgement and care as part of the community.

I trust you too.

But I don't 100% trust myself.

Oh, sure, my intentions are good, but I get enthusiastic. I get engaged! I can end up waving that big old stick around like it ain't no thing. I wouldn't use it, of course. Of course not! But...well, not everyone knows that. What is friendly enthusiasm to me can end up shutting someone down or driving them off, and odds are good I would never even notice.

That sucks.

But what to do? I can't read people's minds. I can't live in a state of constant fear of how I might be portrayed. Living in a world of eggshells is just untenable. So am I just totally screwed?

Maybe not.

It'd be cool to have a comprehensive answer. Or a deep understanding humanity that makes this all unnecessary. But I don't have those, so I just have to settle for a simple rule or two.

1. Take a moment to breath before speaking up
2. Maybe chill a little.

Now, hell, those are for me. Everyone's different, everyone fights different battles. Maybe you have no problem with chill. Maybe you never interrupt or talk over other people.

But maybe there are one or two little rules you could remember that might help too.

Like I said. I trust your judgement, so use it as you would.

Here is the advice I have received and passed about being a playtester for a game Metatopia.

Originally shared by Ray Watters

Here is the advice I have received and passed about being a playtester for a game Metatopia.

* Be honest

* Don't say a game is OK just to "be nice"

* Don't call things or people "stupid", "dumb" or other pejoratives

* Explain what didn't work for you and why, if you can

* Mention things that felt off or wrong, even if you cannot explain why

* Explain what you liked and what worked for you, and why if you can

* Don't expect a traditional beginning, middle and end. You might just be testing combat, or social interactions, or character building.

* Don't try to "fix" a game by offering suggestions on how you believe rules should be changed

* Don't tell people to change their system to another of your favorite systems

* If someone asks you to ignore "X" because they know it isn't working, don't harp on that during your feedback

* Answer any questions by the facilitator as best you can

Nous avons encore tellement de travail...

Nous avons encore tellement de travail...

Originally shared by Pierre M

Super classe, les stands de certains vendeurs de JDR en convention !

Too late to get it free, but it's only $2.00.

Too late to get it free, but it's only $2.00.

Originally shared by Richard Williams (Epistolary Richard)

This post is shareable
*Teen Detective released (and free for a short time)*
Delighted to announce that this teen detective genre game is now up on DriveThru, designed by myself and with cover art by the talented Aviv Or.
Follow this collection to read more about the design over the next few days:
https://plus.google.com/collection/M-yMSE

Why should I care?
Teen Detective is my take on adapting my favourite investigative game (Cthulhu Dark by Graham Walmsley) for the teen detective genre. If you're down with Cthulhu Dark's ultra-light ruleset, its fundamental trust between players and GM, and you like Veronica Mars or other teen detectives then you should give this a look (and download it, because it's free, but not for very long).

Wait, didn't you release this game about a month ago?
That was Teen Noir (which is still available here: http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/222346/Teen-Noir ) it's in the teen mystery genre but a very different game. TN is GMless, designed for one-shots, and really about the strain of a friendship group where one friend is guilty and another is going to take the fall. Teen Detective is far more your classic GM brings a mystery, the players investigate, they find the culprit (or they don't) and then put things right however they think best. They're both teen games, but they scratch very different itches.

So this one is like Veronica Mars?
Yeah, right down to the differing motivations between the teens, dark secrets in the families, and maybe even occasionally destroying evidence to protect themselves at the cost of the investigation.

You've heard of Bubblegumshoe right?
Absolutely, but just as there's Call of Cthulhu, Trail of Cthulhu, Cthulhu Dark and dozens of other horror investigative games I'm hoping there's room for both Bubblegumshoe and Teen Detective in the teen mystery genre.

What's this about three different playstyles? Puzzle, Pulp and Collaborative? How can the same game support all three?
The basic levers in the game are Edges, Lightbulbs and Taking Risks (which may trigger your Dark Secret). The different playstyles are all about the emphasis the GM gives each lever and how she encourages their use. I also write about the basic structure of the mystery and advise GMs about how to weight that structure for the different playstyles.

I couldn't have written Teen Detective for just a single playstyle, there are too many players out there who are into investigative games but enjoy very different approaches to them. I want GMs and players to be up front about the way they want to play this game and then support them in that choice. I know from experience that if a puzzle player, a pulp player and a collaborator all try to play with each other their own way they just piss each other off.

Say, hypothetically, I was writing a systemless teen mystery scenario, could I include the Teen Detective rules in the back of my book so buyers could play my scenario without necessarily having another game system?
That's a highly unlikely scenario, but almost certainly yes! Please talk to me first.






http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/225578/Teen-Detective

3 novembre 2017

Has malewashing another name, that I cannot find this word?

Hello Fellow Game Designers & Publishers


Originally shared by Epidiah Ravachol

Hello Fellow Game Designers & Publishers,

It's time we had The Talk, the #Epimas talk. I know, I know. Halloween is barely in the grave and already we're talking Epimas? It seems to encroach on us earlier and earlier every year. But this needs to get out there before folks start asking me individually.

I 'm afraid that this year, I do not have the time to organize & run a full-bore Epimas this year. This is a little sad for me, because it would have been the 8th year in which we did it. It's brought me a lot of joy over those years.

But I'm choosing to treat this as a reason for celebration--a graduation of sorts. This is the dawn of a new Epimas. A decentralized Epimas. I'm inviting you, if you are so inclined, to run your own Epimas promotion this year.

What Makes an Epimas Promotion an Epimas Promotion

• Folks buying games for their friends & loved ones.

That's it. That's all. However you want to facilitate that is up to you. The details have changed a lot over the years, but the way I've done it in past has always looked a little like this:

• Person A buys a PDF bundle for Person B at a bit of a discount.
• Person A immediately receives a copy of that PDF bundle so they can read up on the games & be ready to run them on Epimas Day.
• Person B receives their gifts via email on Epimas Day (Dec. 24th, of course).
• Persons A & B spend all of Epimas Day playing games and generally just makin merry.

But you don't have to make it as complicated as all that! You may, in fact, be smarter if you don't. I am, as we all know, not smarter, so I'll be running my own quiet little Epimas promotion that will look a hell of lot like that. But you do you. Make it your own.

Tell Me About Your Epimas Promotion, I'll Promote It

If you do one, let me know! I'll shout about it on the social medias (socials media?). I'll make a list, I'll check it at least twice. If anyone with a podcast, radio program, or late night TV show wants to talk to me about the holiday, it's rich history, or just its crass commercialism, I'll be sure to mention everyone on my list. Just tell me what you got to offer and where to find it.

A Giant Thank You to Everyone Who Has Celebrated Epimas These Many Years

Game designers, game publishers, game players, friends & loved ones of game players who accepted these bizarre documents as gifts in good grace, thank you so much for all you've done for Epimas in years past. You've all be the best and have made a haphazard adventure so worthwhile. You'll be hearing more about my Epimas in about a month, but until then just thank you.