Casting Shadows

This is a compiled post for #RPGaDay2022. You can read versions of these at https://castingshadowsblog.com in daily posts with lots of extras and more context (precious context!) and/or watch a composite posting on Runeslinger, my YouTube channel. Do you want to get involved? Get the infographic with all the questions at https://autocratik.com and leap into this adventure in positivity.  &nbs...

In response to a great series of episodes and call-ins on the Nerd's RPG Variety Cast and Bandit's Keep podcast, I have labored to produce this "brief" episode on my relationship with Call of Cthulhu and some of what I have seen of its use in my own groups and out there in the cold, cold world.  Links: Nerd’s RPG Variety Cast • A podcast on Anchor Bandit’s Keep • A podcast on Anchor - - 380 In Def...

This is a compiled post for #RPGaDay2022. You can read versions of these at https://castingshadowsblog.com in daily posts with lots of extras and more context (precious context!) and/or watch a composite posting on Runeslinger, my YouTube channel. Do you want to get involved? Get the infographic with all the questions at https://autocratik.com and leap into this adventure in positivity.  &nbs...

A week of #RPGaDay2022 posts about character from the perspective of the GM. For a different take, check out my Week 4 post on YouTube and the written blog~

This is a compiled post for #RPGaDay2022. You can read versions of these at https://castingshadowsblog.com in daily posts with lots of extras and more context (precious context!) and/or watch a composite posting on Runeslinger, my YouTube channel.  Do you want to get involved? Get the infographic with all the questions at https://autocratik.com and leap into this adventure in positivity. &nbs...

#RPGaDay2022 - Day 7: Share a cool part of a system you love You can read daily posts on these questions at https://castingshadowsblog.com with lots of extras and more context (precious context!)  Do you want to get involved? Get the infographic with all the questions at https://autocratik.com and leap into this adventure in positivity.    #RPGaDay2022 is part of an annual event now...

Question responses for days two through six:  1. Who would you like to introduce to RPGs?  2. What is a great introductory game?   3. When were you introduced to RPGs?   4. Where would you host this first game?   5. Why will they like it?   6. How will you introduce it to more people?    You can read versions of these at https://castingshadowsblog.com in dai...

Question for Day One: Who would you like to introduce to RPGs? You can read a version of this at https://castingshadowsblog.com Do you want to get involved? Get the infographic with all the questions at https://autocratik.com and leap into this adventure in positivity.  #RPGaDay2022 is part of an annual event now in its 9th year. 

#RPGaDay is an annual event in August which runs all 31 days of this important month for gaming and gamers. The event is intended to increase the signal of positive posts about the hobby and help strengthen awareness of great games, great gamers, and great gaming ideas. Post in whatever form you like, wherever you congregate socially online and tag those posts with #RPGaDay2022. Don't forget to sh...

With specific examples from and focus on Mythras, Ubiquity, and FFG Star Wars, this episode goes into some justifications for Mook rules in RPGs. What are they for? How can they differ from game to game? Why do some gamers dislike them?   This topic was released simultaneously on the Casting Shadows YouTube channel where it is a part of three ongoing series on playing the three systems i...

Featuring calls from Menion aka Rob from Confessions of a Wee Tim'rous Bushi, Joe Richter of Hindsightless, and Jason of the Nerds RPG Variety Cast, we expand the conversation about pulps and pulp games to address the questions of how some example systems can affect pulp play, group size for fun and pulpiness, and PCs of unequal capabilities. I hope you will join in on the discussion as despite th...

Inspired initially by discussions in the Saturday Alternators Book Club for RPG players, then finally and fruitfully inspired into actual production by Menion aka Rob of Confessions of a Wee Tim'rous Bushi and his callers and guests, this episode explores thoughts on pulp heroic characters and explores some of my connections with these stories in life and gaming. What pulps were "my" pulps? Aren't...

Please join me as I navigate three very different topics with the help of some kind callers. This episode features calls from hosts of The GMologist Presents, Hindsightless, Spikepit, and Nerd's RPG Variety Cast podcasts. Karl, Joe, Colin, and Jason were kind enough to listen to one or more episodes of this podcast and have called in to give depth and meaning to the conversation. Links to those sh...

Sections include notes on my appearance on Roundtable Roulette ( https://youtu.be/3PlkIWaajKs ) with Craig Shipman and Seth Skorkowsky, thoughts about the next RPGaDay , more on our ongoing but sometimes interrupted Alien Campaign, and a special focus on the once-again recent and always interesting topic: immersion thanks to an interesting series of observations and call-ins appearing on the Nerds...

Joe of Hindsightless and Karl of the GMologist Presents were kind enough to leave voice messages to which I could respond in part of this episode and then seque into talk about two favorite techniques for RPGs: troupes of characters and games spanning generations of such characters~

Bonus Content - This is a more detailed description of how Queensryche's concept album Operation Mindcrime informed the play of a Mage: The Ascension chronicle in the mid-nineties called Broken Homes. 

Music can be a useful tool when playing an RPG, but in my experience, I have found it to be even more useful in preparation for play. in this episode I survey some of the ways I have found to aid my preparation for improvisation with music and playlists. We also touch on, thanks to the interest of The GMologist Presents and Hindsightless podcasts, the use of the incredible Operation: Mindcrime in...

The blame for this episode rests squarely on the shoulders of Jason of the Nerd's RPG Variety Cast. If you have not yet given him your thoughts on this matter, please do so now: Contest Links Nerd's RPG Variety Cast Voice Mail link to Nerd's RPG Variety Cast Links from this Episode: System 1    System Details      Campaign Recap        Ac...

Alienating the Alien . What are some of the elements of Free League's Alien RPG that I find most useful? This episode looks at three: Abstract processing for Detailed outcomes, Conversational Gamespeak, and Layered Consequences. As always, if you would like to communicate with me about the Alien series or any of the other episodes of past seasons of the podcast, you can leave a voice message on An...

In this installment of the preparation for improvisation series using Free League's Alien RPG, we give a brief overview of the campaign so far and look at the process of ongoing assessment and analysis of play which makes it easier to shift and react to how play is really going, rather than how we might want it to go.  Blog Version

This is a partial interlude in the Alien RPG series on horror and improvisation in that it is a different example of the use of improvisation toward a specific genre and player-experience goal for atmosphere and context, but unlike Alien, is high adventure pulp heroics in an implausible setting of super-science and derring-do. Some of the techniques are similar, some are identical, and some are di...

Part 5: Playing the Alien...  On our first session, spontaneous improvisation within an understood framework of in-game and meta goals, and getting going even if not feeling 100% ready. This series of blog, vlog, and pod episodes will explore Alien the Roleplaying Game by Free League from the perspective of preparation for horror and improvisation within the framework of Campaign Mode for Col...

Part 4: Framing the Alien...  On conceptualizing the process of preparation in the context of who the characters are, what the approach to play is, and how those things intersect with the setting and its genre. This series of blog, vlog, and pod episodes will explore Alien the Roleplaying Game by Free League from the perspective of preparation for horror and improvisation within the framework...

Part 3: Hearing the Alien...   On description and how it can be approached as a skill for horror gaming. This series of blog, vlog, and pod episodes will explore Alien the Roleplaying Game by Free League from the perspective of preparation for horror and improvisation within the framework of Campaign Mode for Colonial Marines.       Links:   Choice of Voice Where...

Part 2: Feeding the Alien - On character and the two modes to enjoy them with in this game. This series of blog, vlog, and pod episodes will explore Alien the Roleplaying Game by Free League from the perspective of preparation for horror and improvisation within the framework of Campaign Mode for Colonial Marines.     Links:   Discomfort, Fear, Terror, and Vast Cosmic Horror, o...