The Grizzly Rant

I have a mage at my table. Her name is Sabina, the Pyromage. She has a spell that can either: Clear a Room of up to three, small (2 Heart) Enemies in one hit, or; One-shot a non-fire-resistant boss monster.  Sabina is awesome. Provided the spell doesn't explode in her face, miss... or accidentally hit her sister. Because there is another adventurer in the party. Her name is Agnes, the Twin Blade. She's pretty cool too, and her regular attack can one-shot 1-2 Heart creatures. Add the Kettish Chains' ability to re-roll on high Attempts and she easily does similar damage at close range. I love both these characters. But sometimes Agnes feels like Sabina takes the spotlight a little too much. That's on me as the GM, because Sabina has almost zero ability in STR or DEX tasks, things Agnes excels in. I need to design more STR and DEX based Effort challenges to give Agnes more screentime. Sabina can lay down some heavy covering fire. On the subject of "...

My sister-in-law came to visit us in March and the three of us conquered the Doomvault in a weekend. It ended with our adventuring duo bruised and broken on the shores of Norburg, ready to drag themselves into the city to claim their Kingly Rewards. She returns the end of May, which has given me plenty of time to think of how to design and run the city of Norburg and their next Adventure. My opinions on Towns hasn't changed since my last post . Norburg is a hub of activity and life, essential to their story and Journey. But the details on designing  the town have developed and matured since then and much like my Journey post, I've approached the creation of Norburg with the concepts and principles of ICRPG Room Design: the TTT's, L.O.G., and D.E.W.. There is intention and purpose to everything within the high walls of the city. There is danger. There is drama. There is Adventure. And there is the chance for Rest, re-supply and information gathering before setting ou...

The purpose of this post is to make an argument, based on experience, for designing all Rooms (especially first session Rooms) with a Target 10, using the EASY/HARD rule on the fly to adjust difficulty as needed. Note: If you are reading this, I am assuming that you either A) play ICRPG or B) know the concept of a universal target DC for an encounter. Terminology used here will be from Index Card RPG by RUNEHAMMER GAMES, LLC. I have been playing, designing and GM'ing adventures in ICRPG for a little over a year now. During my brief attempt (and subsequent failure) at launching my own business making adventure supplements, I designed and playtested multiple adventures for entry level, 6 point builds to extreme, high-powered late-game characters with 8 point builds, extra milestones and Epic Loot to start. More recently I ran the Doomvault with for my wife and sister-in law. I also played in several different games with the Ultimate Effort group GM'ed by Mike, Matt and A...

I've been quiet recently.  My presence on G+ and Ultimate Effort have been lacking of late, but not without reason.  I've been busy with one project: the Grizzly Encounter Tiles.   I am pleased to report that all the hard work has been worth it.  I'm about a week away from launching my Patreon page, and with it a free sampler and at least one Basic Tile pack (I won't reveal which quite yet!).  The folks at Big Bad Evil Guy have been a tremendous help turning an idea into a product and the rest of the gang at Ultimate Effort have helped me improve my art game even more since my last update.  Suffice to say, all tiles shown in that last post are severely outdated!  Quick updates in that regard have been moved to my Facebook , which I highly encourage you check out for updates, sneak photos, announcements and special offers outside of Patreon.  For example, the Patreon Launch event, where first-day supporters get a special bonus! I've bee...

Anyone who has been following me on G+, especially the ICRPG Community page, know I've been working on a particular project lately.  For those who are not in the know, I am in the process of creating stylistic map and encounter tiles for use with ICRPG, D&D, and really any type of game you may play.  Samples of my initial artwork can be found for free on the ICRPG Resources page, but I wanted to dive deeper into the nature of the project, what it is, when it's coming, why you want it and what it can do at your table. In short, this is the first edition in a series of 2D terrain boards for online and offline play.  This particular edition will be entirely wilderness and forestland themed.  Each tile is scaled to be a "standard" encounter space with terrain and features.  Distances (in ICRPG parlance) are approximately NEAR in width and FAR in length, giving GMs and Players alike clear understanding of movement in play.  I have future plans to do simila...