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From the people making tabletop RPGs: rough ideas, questions for other designers, design notes, postmortems, how-tos, the occasional essay, and updates from the projects being made here. Short is fine.
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61 posts
Aaron Designer · update to Soul Light3 likes2 comments
Hi everyone! I figured I'd drop a short-ish update here, mainly focusing on the background of how Soul Light was made! But before that, I will also let you know that the section on character creation is complete for the playtest, so things…
DependableSkeleton Designer · update to Cthulhu By Gaslight Adventure - The Goblin Market1 like
\ When Call of Cthulhu adventures & campaigns get imagined, there's ALWAYS some cursed, forbidden tomes to be read and stolen by the PCs. HPL referenced his imaginary University on the Miskatonic River, and there's been casual references to…
Eric Faber Designer · update to Odd Army2 likes
This game takes place in the world of Ordwyk, a once (mostly) peaceful land filled with a smorgasbord of people and critters who lived in (relative) harmony. Sure, there were conflicts and murder and death and all that, but not on such a…
Okkam Designer · update to Okkam: Revised Edition1 like
Hey, y'all! I'm Skip. I wrote a game called OK RPG! a few years back. I also wrote Okkam and ran a successful Kickstarter for it last year. We made block-printed physical zines, custom dice, character pads, and screen-printed patches. My…
CaptainP Designer · update to D20 Dungeon2 likes
Welcome and thank you for stopping by the world of D20 Dungeon.\ \ I've been developing this Solo TTRPG Dungeon Crawler by myself for the past 7 or 8 months and am very excited to finally see who else might enjoy it.\ \ As it stands, D20 is…
Anon Designer · update to Integral (placeholder)
AI will not be making the mechanics or the final rulebook. The extent to what I'll use it for hasn't been decided beyond that. Despite all the hype, AI is only as good as an unpaid intern. Gathering research and stuff that would take hours…
Anon Designer · update to Integral (placeholder)1 comment
The design phase is almost done, so most of the rules and mechanics are in place, though they might be revised or replaced during playtest. Integral, as it is now, is a build your own experience system that has rules, tools, and mechanics…
Aaron Designer · update to Soul Light1 like3 comments
Hello again! I'm getting quite close to having all the base systems of the game written out, and I think I will be putting together a playtest document for levels 1-3 next after this post, so apologies if the next post doesn't come for a…
Mirko Founder2 likes2 comments
I'm literally writing this while I'm sitting in the plane, about to take off. Gamehole Con is my favorite con, and this will be my fourth time attending. If I have a chance, I might even run an impromptu playtest of Tagline. Looking forward…
I recorded a short video about RPG Lab. The first part covers why I built the site. The rest is a walkthrough of the homepage, projects, playtest calls, posts, and the project editor. If you've been meaning to tell a friend or a fellow…
Aaron Designer · update to Soul Light2 likes
Hi all, I mentioned Essence Combos kinda in a one-off sentence in my first discussion about combat without really describing them, and that's because I thought they deserved their own post since that post was getting long. I mentioned in…
kurt Designer · update to Factions & Feuds1 like6 comments
I'm currently working through an edit/proofreading pass and playtesting at Gamehole Con this weekend. Once that is complete, the player's guide will be ready for your review and feedback.
kurt Designer · update to Factions & Feuds1 like
Factions & Feuds originated from my distraction and obsession during the Covid-19 lockdown: megagames. Megagames are large-scale simulations that combine elements of role-playing games, tabletop games, and wargames. These games can involve…
Aaron Designer · update to Soul Light3 likes1 comment
I've sort of mentioned various parts of the combat rules here and there in my other posts, but I wanted to cover some other parts of the game before I got into something as meaty as combat. As I have mentioned before, Soul Light is intended…
Christopher Hogrefe Designer · update to Aetherworlds1 like
Hello again! Things are pretty stressful at the moment, and I am working on redoing some of the core rules for a potential playtest, so I don’t have to much to show just yet. Instead, I thought I would start what I imagine will be a series…
I just launched the first set of user badges. These show up in most places you'd expect them: the homepage feed, posts index, post comments, playtest roster, message threads, and notifications. For now, the following badges exist: Designer…
Aaron Designer · update to Soul Light2 likes5 comments
Hello all! I have realized that I have kinda glossed over how my game really works fundamentally, and I wanted to sort of dig deeper into the philosophy behind how the system works and why I made it that way. I have done a ton of math (I am…
Another fix / improvement: When someone posts a comment on a post or responds to a playtesting thread, the recipient already got an email notification (if they opted into this in their settings). But previously, the only way to reply was to…
Aaron Designer · update to Soul Light
Crafting is always one of the most difficult concepts to approach from pretty much all sides in a tabletop RPG. For the GMs, you have to hope and pray that the subsystem within the game you're playing has some semblance of balance, and it's…
Aaron Designer · update to Soul Light1 like
Next up, Diplomacy! I have also had issues with how social interactions work in trad ttrpgs, and many other systems just kinda "accept defeat" and either just let the players hash things out in-character with little to no mechanics and let…
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