lorcblog

[lorcblog]

I don't think anyone really follows me here, but just in case -and for those following link trails - I'm mostly posting on Bluesky lately.

Maybe I should make more of an effort to cross post.

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You know the saying "comparison is the thief of joy"?

Until this year I honestly unironically always assumed that the saying was about this ^^ bullshit. Because it sums it up so perfectly.

It literally never occurred to me until recently that for most people it was about comparing your own life to someone better off.

something that really sucks about being an artist on the internet in 2024 is that a lot of people don't know how to respond to art anymore. not ALL people, but a noticeable amount of them. they look at a piece of art that you made, that you care about and put time and effort and love into, and they'll say "wow! this is just like [THING YOU'VE NEVER HEARD OF]!" or "omg! it's exactly like [THING THAT ONLY HAS SURFACE LEVEL SIMILARITIES AT BEST]!" and i know those people don't have bad intentions. they're trying to say that they liked what you made. but that's not how it comes off. it comes off as reductive. as dismissive. and the worst thing about it is, if they simply ASKED what my inspiration was, then i'd love to tell them. no art is without a muse and we're all impacted by our experiences. my problem with this type of response is the assumption, and oftentimes the insistence that your thing MUST be based on or inspired by this other thing. that they only value your thing BECAUSE they can make some weird connection to something that is, 99% of the time, either unintentional or entirely unrelated. it just hurts. what did you like about my thing? did you like the colors, the composition? did you like how it made you feel? those types of reflections are so much more valuable than "your story/character/etc reminds me of [other story/character/etc]". and i hope you can understand why.

[lorcblog]

130+ kinds of wizard

Someone on Reddit wanted help brainstorming new power sources for magic users. They said they were even willing to commission someone to help with brainstorming.

I was simultaneously charmed that they were willing to pay, and appalled that someone might accept money for the easiest part of game design. So I came up with a few freebies for them.

I may have gone a bit hard. In my defence I was having fun. Stashing them here for future access:

Channelling ley-lines (it matters where you are)

Siphoning life energy

Bargain with a demon (terrible price yet to be paid)

Owns a pet genie

Guardian angel

Star-powered (constellation theme)

Blessed by a god

Descended from a god (remnant of divine power)

Manipulating your own blood (health>magic)

Magic ink to create tattoos or paintings that come to life (art>magic)

Psychic powers (emphasis on mind-related effects)

In tune with nature

Luck-manipulation (yours and others)

Your power comes from how much other people believe in your powers

Gain magic by stealing/absorbing other people's spells

Using a stolen staff/book full of someone else's magic

Possessed by a powerful magical weapon

Animal-themed magic granted by a nature spirit

Every spell is a pact with a minor local spirit

Martial artist whose techniques have magical effects

Cult leader who draws powers from your followers' faith

You make and use wands and other disposable magic tools

Shadow manipulation, weak against the sun.

On-theme magic from your allegiance to the elemental plane of whatever

Elemental channeller, but only one element at a time (non-traditional elements are coolest)

Haunted by the ghost of a powerful wizard who casts for you

You're dead but use various spells to stay in the living realm

Brought back from the dead by a magical patron who gave you a mission

Drank a weird potion and now you're always burping up spells

Various alchemical potions that allow you to transmute or rearrange matter

Gain power from various binding vows and taboos

All your power resides in the magitech staff you're always tinkering with

Compulsive reader who fuels their magic by sacrificing memories

Chaos wizard whose magic only works because of how unpredictable it is

Carries a deck of cards, each card has a different spell on it

Latest of a long magical bloodline, with history and responsibilities

Untutored natural talent whose magic is raw - potent but hard to control

Possessed by a demon that hates you, but can't afford to let you die

Possessed by an angel that loves you, but doesn't want to hurt anyone

A mad alchemist replaced all your blood with a magic potion

You were hit by lightning and the lightning decided to stay in you

Power from the sun and moon, with different powers under each

Manipulating language to create magical effects

Combining runes with special meanings in various combinations

Sharing magic with a twin, so you need to take turns

Devoting yourself to someone and gaining magic that can only affect them

Gain spells from the icky monster parts you eat

Balance magic, where you need to match the harm and help your spells do

Ghost magic, binding the souls of the dead to a purpose

Rainbow magic, each colour does something different

Focusing your magic through special gems to create spell effects

Inscribing your spells on weapons and armour

Wearing your spells as armour, "spending" them for extra effect

Summoning the spirits of legendary heroes

Summoning the spirits of legendary weapons/tools

Fleshcrafting - manipulating the body of yourself and others

Full of magical centipedes

Fire and ice magic, but try to balance use of both so you don't freeze/burn

An angel and a demon do you favours as they compete over your your soul

You're a dragon or giant wizard's familiar

Sacred geometries and the hidden powers of numerology

Born with a finite amount of magic power and when it's used up it's all gone

Mirror magic - illusions, jumping into reflections or making them real.

Smoking pipeweed to make smoke constructs, walk on clouds etc

Burned as a witch and didn't die, kept alive but on fire by magic

Not a real wizard - all your "spells" are tricks and lies

Very flexible magic but can never cast the exact same spell twice

Your magic overflows – you have to cast spells because you’ll explode if it builds up in you

Your magic is a literal biological parasite living in your body

Eating magic items to recharge/boost your spells

You only know one spell, but it’s a really useful one

Use the iron in your blood to control magnetism; railgun beats fireball

You’ve got a loyal elemental serving in place of one limb

Law magic that sets up terms and conditions for others to obey, or face the consequences

Part of an organisation of allied mages all drawing their power from the same artificial source

Dream magic; putting people to sleep, prophecy and manifesting nightmares

You’re a dream creature in the waking world and don’t really understand magic’s not meant to work

Drawing power from the scrimshawed bones of ancient beasts

Water-powered so you recharge in the rain and get dehydrated if you cast too much

Bargaining; you can magically enforce contracts and use magic to trade in abstract qualities

Alien from another plane whose “magic” is 100% natural, but needs to use “spells” to perform mundane actions

Halfway to being a vampire – holding the transformation at bay with potions and using your powers like spells

Rage-powered magic that’s less effective the happier you are

Stapled a bunch of beholder eyestalks on to yourself

Power from obscurity – the less someone knows about you, the stronger your spells are to them

Wealth-powered magic where you sacrifice currency for spell effects

Namer – find something’s true name (or name it yourself) to have power over it

Only follower of a tiny god who demands great obedience but performs tiny miracles

Devotee of a trickster god where your spells only work if they’re causing clever chaos

Reincarnation of a powerful wizard who doesn’t remember all of their past life yet

You flunked out of wizard college and don’t really understand what you’re doing, it just works, OK?

Undead-eater who channels the necromantic energy of other necromancers

Gaining the powers/knowledge of a thing by wearing the right mask/disguise

Power spells by imbibing magical drugs/alcohol that cause increasing impairment

Negotiating favours from the fair folk

Your magic consists entirely of powerful rituals with lasting effects that take at least half an hour to cast

Your spells must be powered by the sacrifices of other people, so you’re always trading favours to keep casting

Magic granted by one specific tree which you must protect at all costs

Your family is bonkers rich so you just have an invisible magical butler

Magic granted by a hive of friendly enchanted bees that you carry like a backpack

Paradox magic where every night tomorrow-you teaches yesterday-you the spells you will have needed

Every spell is a little pet creature you've found and looked after

Spell breeder where you make new spells by combining old ones

Creating prophecies that always come true

[That’s the end of the ones I posted on Reddit. I think that’s 104. New ones below]

Your “spells” are magical diseases you’re infected with; try not to pass them on

You passed through the dolmen gate to awaken your mage-sight

Replaced one eye with an orb of power

Plant spellseeds into the earth every night and harvest the spells for casting each morning

Create temporary links to places and creatures to channel spells based on them

Lunar magic whose spells change with the moon phase

Saved the life of a magic fish you gave you powers

Spellcasting powers are a duty handed down across the generations

You’re a naturally magical creature polymorphed into human shape

Your magic “powers” are actually a curse eating you alive

You know potent runes which you sketch onto surfaces with chalk for spell effects

Drank from a magic fountain and all the magic climbed in to yourself

Someone else bargained for power and you got it due to a clerical error

Your “spells” are fate conspiring to keep you alive for a greater destiny/doom

Prodigy who invented a school of magic unrecognised by conventional wisdom

Monk who receives magical focus through mortification and asceticism

Gained sympathetic magic from following in the path of a legendary hero

Satchel full of scrolls that never seems to run out

Scientific and impious “prayer” that calls down divine favours through arcane means

Coat of many colours, every patch woven with a different enchantment

Parasitic haemotroph vine infection grows magical fruits you can eat, throw etc

Golf bag of magic staves collected from defeated rival wizard's

Orbiting halo of arcane crystals with unique spell-like powers

Exile from a magically advanced lost civilisation

Time-travelling tourist from a magically advanced possible future

Channels raw magical energy through a carefully-faceted focal lens

Untamed magic erupts from you unpredictably

Destined for greatness, some of your future power leaks back through time

Aided and guided by the souls of your ancestors

Explorer from an undersea kingdom who had to learn magic to survive above water

From a magic-hating culture that cursed you with this talent to be an asset to your people

Born without a soul and magic rushed in to fill the void

Lost your soul and a wizard gave you theirs to save yourself

Cursed with ever-growing hair, you tie it into knots and braids to weave spells

[lorcblog]

I made another 5 page pamphlet exploration of a (hopefully) interesting idea. About what if a new God took over the position of God of Death, and they were deeply jealous.

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Work in progress cover for my next pamphlet-thing. Getting there I think.

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This chimerical monstrosity is called a chorus. I'm not sure everything I tried here worked, but maybe it's ok? Passable for what I need it for anyway...

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Indulgent mini-vent.

I've seen this exchange too many times.

I know that "What's the Powered By The Apocalypse system?" is not a straightforward question, but "It's 2d6+stat" is probably the single least helpful answer possible.

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"My hat!" mkII

Couldn't help going back to this and fixing it up. Rider was too small, the demon was too generic and the situation not urgent enough.

Mostly the demon was too generic though. Demons shouldn't be boring.

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<3 <3 <3 <3

People are wonderful!

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They've made some some aftermarket modifications.

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Save your hat!

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Despite my best efforts it looks like I'm back on the black and reds.

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The hard work theory of RPGs

My big RPG theory is that the purpose of an RPG book is to do the hard work for you.

RPGs are a creative endeavour and most of the fun what the players contribute. But a good RPG makes sure that the decisions the players have to make are the most interesting ones. A bad RPG offloads the work of understanding or interpreting the system on to the players and becomes burdensome to play.

A good game is helpful. It does the hard work for you and leaves the fun decisions for you and your group.

There's plenty of talk over what makes an RPG system good, but I'm going further and asserting that this principle is true for every aspect of a game.

Any of us can come up with the bones of a good setting idea in a few minutes. But if you've ever sat down and tried to write it up in a usable fashion you'll know there's so more to it than that. A good RPG has also done those not-fun bits for you. Where fiddly details matter, they've done the homework and compiled them for you. The author has made the whole thing thematically coherent, with enough detail to inspire but not so much as to feel constricting. And the author has done the hard work of identifying the most important bits, and expressing them succinctly enough to ensure that all prospective players are on the same page about it.

Because another big part of "the hard work" is finding the right game for your group and getting them to play it. A good game uses words and art to demonstrate what will be fun about it. And it presents itself honestly so that you can make an informed decision whether to play it or not.

And that's where I'll distinguish between games that are good and games I enjoy. There's plenty of good games out there I will never play because they did a good job communicating what they are about so that I know I will not enjoy them. Likewise games that present themselves as one thing, but it turns out are most fun when played a different way, are flawed (and often end up with players angry at each other for playing "wrong").

A good game shows you at the most fun way to play it, makes that as easy as possible and then delivers on the promise.

There's certain popular games (that I'm not brave enough to name), which are very unexciting by traditional metrics. Their mechanical systems are generic, repurposed (or absent!), doing little if anything in service of their premise.

But what they do do is effectively communicate a novel way to play. They do a fantastic job communicating that, how to do it and why it will be fun. They make people excited to play them, even if they'll be rolling the same familiar dice the same familiar way.

By the hard work theory, what makes them "good" RPGs is that the game book made it easy for the players play a fun game that they wouldn't have played otherwise.

This is already too many words. Suffice to say I also have strong feelings about other ways this applies to rules, settings and more.

[lorcblog]

My amateur-hour lessons learned about writing (as opposed to designing) RPGs

Having now released a whopping two (2) RPGs out into the wild I’ve zero authority to say what’s good practice. But I kept a big list of lessons learned. It’s something I find helpful to refer back to. There’s a few traps I find myself repeatedly falling into and this reminds me of them and how to avoid them.​

I’ll never create anything good if I’m not willing to create something bad first.

Even if nobody else reads or plays this, I’m creating for my own entertainment and self-improvement.

Every idea is perfect in my head. Pin them down in writing to examine them more critically.

Talk about what’s cool about this game, not how it’s unlike other games.

Directly stating what the thing is is clearer and quicker than saying what the thing isn’t. 

Write for the benefit of people who’d enjoy the game, not to persuade those who won’t.

At all times consider what the reader wants to know and what it’s helpful for them to be told. 

Say the thing without preamble. Saying I’m going to say a thing is a waste of space.

That means not beginning a section by restating the header either.

In rules, say clearly what to do before getting hung up listing all the things not to.

Avoid game voice – “and yet-”, “their very-”, “the utter-” etc. Just write normally.

Don’t be allergic to contractions. Sentences get stilted without them.

Make it fun to read – address the reader directly and let a little personality show through. 

Starting a sentence with a conjunction is fine as a little treat.

Mostly. Tend. Usually. Qualifying all my statements is weak writing. Let exceptions prove the rule.

It’s fine to write things not intended to go in the final doc. Sometimes it’s helpful for me to write it, even knowing it’s destined for the cutting room floor.

Writing lists is fun and easy but it’s not real writing. (Oh hey!)

Coming up with the perfect name is a problem for later – placeholder names are fine.

Designer notes are useful but indulgent. Exercise restraint.

If a big designer note is really that important, it should be part of the text. 

For each section consider whether I’m addressing the player or the GM. Be deliberate and consistent. 

Adjectives, adverbs and repetition are a great way to pad a paragraph out into unreadable fluff. Delete ruthlessly.

No editing partway through a section. I can’t judge information priority and flow until I’ve gotten to the end.

If I’ve finished a bit, move right on to the next bit instead of getting bogged down in re-writes. There’s no prizes for most deleted drafts.

When a section of the draft’s good enough, mark it in a different colour so I can track my progress and know what to leave alone.

Do I really need other people’s feedback? Or am I just avoiding writing by talking about it instead? 

Write what I can, when I can. If I can’t write one part right now, write a different part. If all I can write at the moment is a list of what I want to write, then write that. Try to get some momentum going.

It’s too much to hope that I keep my notes organised, but for all that’s holy keep them in one place.

A proper draft needs at least some sense of how it's going to be laid out or there will be very nasty surprises.

Nevertheless, no draft survives contact with layout.

The best part of the process is when I realise that I've already written all the other bits I need and can just slot them in.​

[lorcblog]

Oh this is the good dopamine, yeah.

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It's done! What Big teeth, my rpg about minimum wage werewolves is now available to download free on Itch.

99 pages and full of lots of gribbly werewolf art.

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Foxen.

It was fun to make a proud heraldic beaft.