Weekly Assembly: Epic Simplicity and Kickstarter

This weekend, Nevermet Press closed up shop. While it’s probably temporary, it’s still sad to hear about.

In somewhat related news, we’re planning on 2 more Weekly Assembly posts before discontinuing the current format. We’ll still be finding cool links and adding them to our searchable RPG Links database, but the deadline of producing the newsletter is starting to suck the fun out of the process.

But for now, on with this week’s links!

At Home

Articles posted here on The Gamer Assembly.

Away

Content from people involved with The Gamer Assembly posted elsewhere across the Internet.

• The Places of Pyre: The Shaman’s District by Brent Newhall at Dr. Worldcrafter: Come explore this holy and magical quarter in the abandoned city of Pyre.

• How to Run an Online RPG Convention by Brent Newhall at Dr. Worldcrafter: Brent takes a first stab at what when right and wrong with running Indie+.

Product Announcements

New products and special events announced this week.

• Announcing the “Classics Return” Blog Carnival » Daily Encounter by Adam Page at Daily Encounter: Love D&D 4e? Join up and create something for this blogfest, running during GenCon.

• After Three Years, the Gnomes Put on New Pants at Gnome Stew: Take a look at Gnome Stew’s redesigned site. More content, front and center.

• Psi-punk: A Fudge Cyberpunk RPG by Jacob Wood at Kickstarter: Psionics in a cyberpunk setting? Bring it on. They’re raising funds for art by Melissa Gay who did art for The Dresden Files RPG, and for the production costs of a print run.

• Shadowrun Online by Cliffhanger Productions at Kickstarter: Since the other Shadowrun Kickstarter went so well, they’re kickstarting a browser and tablet-based MMO. Interesting.

Notes From Abroad

Other interesting articles and cool links.

• D&D Outsider: Driders on the Storm by Jared von Hindman at Wizards of the Coast: Join the D&D Outsider as he takes an irreverent look at the challenges inherent in a trip to the underdark.

• Everything is possible at imgur: A 4-page comic on the infinite possibilities inherent in tabletop RPGs.

• Game Fodder: The Keepers’ Keep at Game Knight Reviews: Visit this fantasy mountaintop library in your next campaign. Who knows what knowledge the Keepers wish to impart?

• The Concise Spell List for ANY Version of D&D or OSR « Wrathofzombie\’s Blog at Wrathofzombie’s Blog: A list of OSR spells that fit on 2 lines or less.

• Reality Makes the Best Fantasy: Body Modifications at Troll in the Corner: Using tattoos, piercings, scarification, and ritual mutilation in your game.

• Not Everyone Thinks The Same Way at The Ongoing Campaign: An anecdote on storytelling in the sandbox, letting your characters do what they want, and listening to the desires of everyone at the table, not just the GM.

• Episode 6: Brent P Newhall and Jason Morningstar at Roll for News: Ryan finds out about running Indie+ from Brent and about the forthcoming RPG Durance from Jason.

• A Kickstarter Infographic at Wired: Bite-sized analysis of Kickstarter projects. Interesting reading.

• Everything you always wanted to know about “Into The Odd” but were afraid to ask at Stargazer’s World: Michael talks with Chris McDowall, designer of Into The Odd among other RPGs.

• The Confessions of a Fantasy Gamer, by Prof MAR Barker at Vintage Wargaming: This letter pokes at both sides in the controversy between wargamers and fantasy gamers. Originally published in Wargamer’s Newsletter #199 dated October 1978.

• The Books of Magic at Untimately: A system for discrete books of magic containing specific spells to use in your OD&D or OSR game. Now with 20% more forbidden knowledge!

• May the Dice Be With You! at Grognardia: A quick look at the Gygax-signed French version of the Red Box from 1982. Same art, but different artists.

• Crippled by Knowledge at Take On Rules: Derailing game prep by improving the process like a good code developer. It’s an interesting angle on creativity and open mode vs. closed mode.

• Tying PCs to Published Adventures at Sly Flourish: Need some ideas to hook PCs to a canned adventure? Have some ideas about creating ties that bind the party to the adventure.

• Epic Adventure at Project Perko: Thoughts about why epic adventures feel more mundane as we experience more play.

• Fantasy Realm Mixing Board at Blue Boxer Rebellion: I want a working one of these for my games. Makes you think about what “normal” means in your campaign world.

• Surviving The Dungeon, Expeditiously at The Riders of Lohan: Every old school spellslinger needs this random table to determine how high to carry their robes when running for their lives.

• Running A No Character Advancement Game at Gnome Stew: Making a case for running games without XP or skill points or any non-story character changes.

• Save Versus Stupid Episode One: Patronage at Save Versus Stupid: There’s a new podcast in town. Weighing in at just under 30 minutes, the premiere episode explores project patronage through sites like Kickstarter and IndieGoGo.

• Sitting Down to Run a New Game at Take On Rules: Here’s a brief overview of how to approach and start running a new game.

• Missing Magic: Artifacts & Relics at Asparagus Jumpsuit: Take a sneak peek at a couple of items from Missing Magic: Artifacts & Relics, a supplement for Pathfinder.

• Cutting Room Floor: Freelancing and Cut Material at Gaming as Women: Since when do Vampires become homicide detectives? Since the Prince invites them to tea and challenges them Miss Marple style.

• Simpler by Monte Cook at Monte Cook Games: Striving for simplicity in RPG rules and tools.

• Preview: Race to Adventure! at A Man’s Brain-Attic: An actual play of Evil Hat’s forthcoming board game set in the Spirit of the Century world.

• An Old Fart on Old School– Wherein I will pontificate upon the actual meaning of “Old School”. at Monkey in the Cage: Spoiler: Old School isn’t a ruleset, it’s an attitude.

MetaRoundup

A roundup of roundups featuring links of interest to the tabletop RPG community.
Please let us know about other weekly roundups in the comments!

• Game Knight Reviews comes out with Friday Knight News articles on Fridays. Check out this week's Bane Edition to see a gaming table made entirely out of LEGO, the A+ Project for a more positive Internet, and imposing character consequences on an absent player.

• Roving Band of Misfits publishes their Weekly Roundup column every Sunday. This week's ENnies Voting Is Open Edition gives us a cost/benefit analysis of buying Dungeon Command just for the minis, ways to make an investigative adventure work for you, and tips on making the switch from GM to player.

• Keith Davies maintains In My Campaign and on Mondays he publishes a collection of Links of the Week including recommended Kickstarter projects and interesting YouTube videos. Take a look at this week's collection which includes a random adventure generator hosted at Between are the Doors, a Kickstarter for a Japanese horror dark fantasy campaign setting for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, and making a watermelon explode with 500 rubber bands.

• Gaming As Women gathers links in their This Week in Gaming and This Week in Feminism series of articles on Sundays. Both series are collected under the News category. This Week in Gaming features the role of debriefing in freeform games, interviews with Paula Dempsey and Anna Kreider, and the top 6 myths surrounding gamer women.

• Critical Hits aggregates their Twitter feed and publishes it on Sundays under Critical Bits. This week’s Critical Bits mentions the ENnies voting page going live, an important note about submission fees for next year’s ENnies, and a collection of this year’s ENnie-nominated products available at DriveThru RPG.