mapsmonstersamazing

[mapsmonstersamazing]

I HAVE ACQUIRED A VINTAGE DIGITAL DUPLICATOR

The government was trying to get rid of it just because it's old and kind of sucks at everything. EXCEPT MAKING RISOGRAPHS.

When I figure this thing out I am going to be so powerful.

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clap along if you feel like a wraith without a tomb!

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Now one thing where you should seek to exceed Matt Mercer and Brennan Lee Mulligan as GMs is in the number of transfems you have at your table: experts testimony shows us that Good GMs usually have at least one transfeminine person present at their game (oftentimes it is the GM herself!), and both Mercer and Mulligan struggle in this regard.

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Wanna make a gothic punk RPG about playing cool edgy cartoon animals, probably using an adaptation of the proprietary d10 dice pool system from the World of Darkness games

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Idea: if you’re playing a game where zombies, or vampires, or the Borg, or werewolves are a major part of the plot, here’s a devil’s bargain or plot enriching device. Let’s say a PC gets affected by one of these infecting monsters - a toxic mutagen is sprayed on the Monk during a battle with some yuan-ti, and the fight is far from over.

Now, the rules might say the Monk immediately morphs into a serpentine version of himself, but the rule of cool still applies. “I’ll let you resist by sheer willpower for a few minutes,” you tell the player, “but if you do, there’s no curing this.” With the Witch at 0 hit points, and the Fighter surrounded, it’s a dramatic decision - and the Monk will have another dramatic moment later when he says goodbye to his friends as he becomes a bloodthirsty snake monster.

Would you take the deal for your character? Save the day, but become an enemy of the party or run off into the forest? Or would you accept immediate transformation, with the possibility that they could save their friend later on?

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Inevitable is our Doomed Arthurian Western TTRPG, where your party of disastrously sad cowboy knights try, and fail, to stop the apocalypse. This beautiful A4 hardcover book contains all the rules, character creation and the setting for your campaign.

Inevitable features six unique endgame scenarios called Dooms, which the players fight desperately to stave off, but will ultimately come to pass. These range from the fearsome Great Drake to the enigmatic Tower Wizards.

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The Gay Bar is the perfect equivalent to the tavern for a modern urban setting

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Was armour really as useless as it is in fantasy?

Remember, if armour was easily pierced, it wouldn’t be worth the cost and weight, but if it was NEVER pierced, it wouldn’t have been worth the effort and cost of making and training with weapons. The truth must always lie somewhere in the middle.

But for fiction, sometimes the story is more important!

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Dude, that "Powergaming is doing *just* enough damage your GM doesn't buff the creature's HP" comment has lodged itself in my brain like grenade shrapnel.

This is an arms race of fools.

It's really funny too, because that sort of thinking is like actual factual metagame thinking of the sort that many of these people supposedly hate. "We can't optimize our characters to deal too much damage because then the GM will start artificially inflating monster HP" is thinking that is completely disengaged from the fiction of the game and just trying to approach player expressions of system mastery as bad behavior to be curtailed! It sucks so bad!

The whole situation is akin to these people trying to do five-dimensional mind chess while playing snakes and ladders

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Sometimes reading a new indie RPG gives you an insight into the principles of game design you'd have never arrived at on your own.

Sometimes reading a new indie RPG gives you a sum-of-2dX lookup table with its entries in alphabetical order.

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High Concept Indie Game Generator 1.0

One day, a…

teenage girl

cute robot

child or young adult of ambiguous gender

female-coded artificial intelligence

furry woodland creature

sapient geometric shape

… goes on a journey to:

an enchanted forest.

a mysterious underground kingdom.

a derelict space station.

a dying world.

Purgatory/Limbo.

the realm of stories.

With the aid of:

a socially awkward scientist

an ugly but well-meaning monster

an eclectic band of fellow exiles

a spirit or deity of uncertain motives

a mysterious benefactor who communicates though notes or recordings

the player (who the protagonist is aware of and can talk to)

… our hero harnesses the power of:

friendship

their own mind

grotesque physical transformations

Jungian archetypes

a childhood hobby or pastime

literacy

… and contends with fearsome foes via:

battles of wits

match-three minigames

collectible card duels

turn based JRPG-style combat

ritualised sports matches

talking about their feelings

… to overcome the forces of:

social conformity.

institutional racism.

divine authority.

gender roles.

inevitable fate.

Capitalism.

In the end, it’s revealed that:

God is evil

the narrator and/or the user interface has been lying to you

this has all happened before, and will happen again

the player character is secretly the villain

it was all a dream - but not your dream

we’re all just characters in a video game

… leading to:

revolution.

reconciliation of sworn foes.

the hero’s ascension to godhood.

the hero’s tragic but willing self-sacrifice.

escape from the prison of reality.

universal annihilation.

Reviewers harshly criticise the game’s:

awkward controls

repetitive gameplay

over-wordy dialogue

short and linear narrative

heavy-handed emotional manipulation

low animation budget

… but universally praise its:

outstanding soundtrack.

outstanding soundtrack.

outstanding soundtrack.

outstanding soundtrack.

outstanding soundtrack.

outstanding soundtrack.

The fandom, for their part:

become obsessed with an incidental side character

argue endlessly over the appropriateness of popular ships

produce vast quantities of angsty YouTube AMVs

harass the developers on social media

attempt to start a religious movement

draw lots of anatomically improbable porn

… thus cementing their public reputation as a bunch of weirdos. Meanwhile, the much-anticipated sequel fails to eventuate owing to the fact that:

the creative lead has left the gaming industry to become a lumberjack.

the Kickstarter spent all its money on novelty t-shirts.

the source code has been lost in a mysterious accident.

the developers all burned out on console port QA.

the writer and the artist had a falling-out and hate each other now.

the cliffhanger ending was just trolling you.

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"How might Small(tm) fantasy creatures use bows?"

Tiny bow was surprisingly fun to wield. Might use that again sometime 😁

Patreon still exists for all your art reference and bonus content needs!

And you can find more fantasy creatures doing archery here:

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Art by Maxime Desmettre

(check ALTs for piece details)

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In battle, that is!

If you like this stuff, please consider supporting me on Patreon, where you’ll find bonus content, tutorials and art references!

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When inventing a fantasy religion a lot of people a) make the mistake of assuming that everyone in fantasy world would worship the same gods and b) assume that polytheistic religions see all of their gods as morally good

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For weird dice Wednesday I submit gingerbread d20 I made for the last session before Christmas. I got to roll it and it rolled a nat 20!

This took a whole day to make and involved filing down many triangles to fit, and it tasted incredible.

­

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Yup returning to necromancy, I’m so back. And you’re so back, and you’re so back, and you’re so back, and you’re