#tabletop gamers

[darkelfdice]

Our latest Kickstarter is now live!

Magic Potion Dice

Shimmering Liquid Core Dice Sets -- Bring Amazing Dice to Your Gaming Table

[mrkapao]

Loved shopping board games and checking out all those miniatures at Strategicon: Gateway 2024!

[fantastictalesofadventure]

𝐓𝐫𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐧𝐨 𝐨𝐧𝐞! 👀 👀 👀

[vintagerpg]

Once Little Soldier and Phoenix went belly up in 1981, Lou Zocchi’s Gamescience bought the “Book of” series. I believe either dead stock or reprints of Monsters and Demons came out with Gamescience branding. Later, all six were collected in this, The Fantasy Gamer’s Compendium (1983).

I have seen the digest versions of three of these in the wild (for frankly bonkers prices): Book of Shamans, Book of Treasure and Book of Sorcery. Shamans is a whole new class, complete with a custom spell list, that is framed around accessing the spirit world in a way that reflects I guess broad assumptions about tribal magical systems. Its OK! Treasure is what you’d expect, a collection of magic items pulled from myth and legend in the first part and from genre fiction in the second. It is pretty good! Sorcery is an interesting, if slightly unwieldy reconfiguration of the magic user class, explicitly arranged around demonology and pulp notions of Western occult traditions. Basically, it’s intended to provide mechanics that allow a class to summon all the folks listed out in Book of Demons. It also has a collection of occult-themed magic items, like the Hand of Glory, that I find delightful. That’s probably the most useful thing for me, personally, in the whole “Book of” series.

The last Book collected here is the Book of Mystery, which I am not sure ever saw print as a standalone Little Soldier product. It presents a new class (Lord of Mystery), the new skill system those characters use, and an organization they belong to, which safeguards high science for a time when humanity is ready for it (the Lords of Mystery are descended from the original humans, who crashed here [wherever that is] in a colony ship millennia ago). Many of the classes skills are trained and require quests. They seem to get access to a lot of abilities. It seems like a pain in the butt, but an interesting one, almost like a more monastic version of Dave Hargrave’s Techno class from Arduin.

[raakdos-battlemap]

[Ravnica Battlemap]Judith's Secret Club 32x56

Hidden deep within the chaotic labyrinth of Rix Maadi lies Judith’s Secret Club, a forbidden sanctuary of luxury and bloodshed, crafted for the elite of the Cult of Rakdos to indulge in their twisted pursuit of pain and pleasure. The air is thick with the scent of sulfur and fresh blood, as dim flames leap from braziers placed at the center of the room, casting flickering shadows over the blood-red couches and heavy crimson curtains. These curtains not only muffle the cacophony of the outside halls but also provide an air of mystery and belonging for the audience within.

More variations of this map:

[openstorygames]

Kids Play TTRPGs

There are plenty of people who started playing D&D or other TTRPGs as kids. Heck, imaginative play (which all kids engage in on some level and in some manner) is central to what TTRPGs do. Roleplaying is a critical part of developing your child self as a person!

So what's the benefit of giving kids a rule-bound system like D&D, Quest, or Kids on Bikes? Why should kids play TTRPGs and not just make-believe?

TTRPGs teach boundaries.

Some of this depends on how a particular group runs, but a healthy TTRPG group teaches kids where boundaries are and how to respect them.

This can show up in lots of ways.

letting dice determine success

working within the limitations of a class, feature, or spell description

avoiding upsetting or scary topics, as requested by a player

offering trigger warnings and safety tools

accepting when a GM says no

respecting when another player says no

Some of those things are organic to telling a story together. Some of them are brought in to keep the game fun for everyone, like safety tools. All of these examples—and more!—help kids practice boundaries one step removed from real life, where things are a bit harder.

TTRPGS provide escape.

As adults, we think of TTRPGs as escape from the crushing reality we live in. We can free ourselves from the news cycle or our social media feeds for a few hours and pretend we live in a world where our actions are world-changing (and I'm talking saving-the-world-from-evil-powers world-changing).

Kids need escape too! Not so that they're living outside of the world, but so they can practice the skills they need to live within it.

It's way easier to advocate for your PC who's scared of creepy crawlies than it is to admit your skin crawls around your buddy's pet snake.

Kids can practice all sorts of social skills in the freedom of TTRPGs because those games provide escape and distance from the world they actually inhabit. For example:

admitting fears

facing conflict

handling disagreement

learning about themselves

experimenting with consequences (from stealing a loaf of bread to going full murderhobo at times)

setting goals and making plans

Games are low stakes ways for all of us to practice tough conversations or new social skills. Why not let kids get a leg up by teaching them to role play?

TTRPGs build confidence.

Practice makes perfect, and TTRPGs are a great place to practice your sense of self (while inhabiting a character).

As kids get more confident roleplaying their PC, they learn gain confidence in who they are and speaking from that place.

This doesn't look like adults might expect though. We think of the bard suddenly offering a grand speech, or the shy loner forging bonds with the rest of the party.

Kids gaining confidence might not look like what you expect (more on that another time), but TTRPGs help clear the path for confident, empowered kids. And that's something worth making space for!

[junipermoonlite]

*First time playing DND* ... I'm all in

DM: that's not-

*Pushing all my chips into the middle of the table*

DM: where did you get those

[axolotldice]

FIREHEART - 8 piece set

This set is inspired by Aelin Ashryver Galathynius from the book series Throne of Glass

[tabletopresources]

white wizard Raven by macarious

Check out Tabletop Gaming Resources for more art, tips, and tools for your game!

[prodigyduck]

Continuing with the Transformers Contact Builds, here is another NPC from my current campaign: Brainstorm!

This is unofficial, fan-made content using the #Transformers #Essence20 #rpg by Renegade Games Renegade Game Studios

[fanonical]

a good thing to remember as a dm: try not to punish your players, just give them the consequences of their actions, whether those consequences are good or bad

[grantlyon]

Over the past month, I've released a lot of Top 10 Category Videos, and it all culminates in this video! I've done Top 10 videos for Party Games, Cooperative Games, Family Games, Small Box Games, Card Games, Strategy Games, Unique Games, and Two-Player Games. This video is the best of the best of them. No categories, just my personal favorite 10 games.

[mrkapao]

The Kickstarter for my copy of 'HENSHIN! A Sentai RPG: Guest Star Expansion' from Cave of Monsters Games came in last week!

Also picked up the main TTRPG book with the 'Rider Konchu' (Kamen Rider) and '3 Minutes' (Ultra Man) books.

[fantastictalesofadventure]

When those PCs have low perception scores...

[vintagerpg]

From the back cover of The Ultimate Powers Book (1986): “Two-hundred and ninety-three powers times five ranges times eighteen power lives equals—26,370 discrete powers!” Now, TSR products, particularly for the Marvel Super Heroes line, are prone to exaggerating, and it is true that the claim of nearly 27,000 discrete powers is a bit much, but that doesn’t really diminish the monstrous utility of the book.

The core box for Marvel Super Heroes didn’t have character creation at all. The idea was that players would just take the roles of established Marvel characters. The Advanced box introduced character creation, but the list of powers was limited and the system generally produced characters that were underpowered compared to those from the comics. Ultimate Powers hopes to change that, with a brand new creation system that aims to be flexible enough to create characters from the cosmic level on down to regular folks. It builds off a robust pool of “form” templates — cyborg, induced mutant, demon, etc — and then builds up, next with the origin of powers, abilities, weaknesses, the actual powers (arranged by type) and so on. The powers themselves allow for a good amount of detail and fine tuning — not so much as Champions, but enough to feel bespoke.

Its rare, I think, for this kind of sourcebook to totally transform its game, but that is exactly what Ultimate Powers does — playing these characters is its own sort of experience, different from the basic or advanced game. Not bad for a 96-page book! Well, a 96-page book with three columns, small text and no pictures. Dense!

[raakdos-battlemap]

Phyrexia encounter #004 Path to the Norn's Palace

The Fair Basilica, a white-aligned sphere built in the image of Elesh Norn, decorated with statues and monuments to her. It contains Norn's throne room, though she now resides in the plane's second layer and designates the unification of the plane to Atraxa in her stead. Though no light from the plane's suns can reach this layer, its structures generate their light; the layer's walls, composed of ossified Phyrexian corpses of those Norn deemed perfect, glow white, while crimson capillaries etched into its marble-esque floor glow blood-red.

More variations of this map: