RPG Blogs
May 17, 2012 Links and Plugs
- The Enchanted Inkpot (Caroline Hooton) on Jasmine Richards.
- The SFFWRTCHT Interview: Author N. M. Singel.
- Reddit interviews Michael Dirda.
- Geek's Guide to the Galaxy interviews Brian Greene (podcast).
- DisinfoCast Matt Staggs interviews Warren Ellis (podcast).
- Book View Cafe (Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff) on Writing Belief Systems.
- Janice Hardy on Crossing Words Off Your List: Making the Most of Editing "What Not to Use" Lists.
- Kate Elliott (Tansy Rayner Roberts) on Looking for the Women (in Ancient Rome).
- The King of Elfland's Second Cousin on Super Hero Narratives and Our Re-discovered Love for Them.
- Juliette Wade on Dialogue, and specificity: How talk depends on the talkers.
- Book Life Now (Jim C. Hines) on Do I Have to Have a Facetwibblogger+ Page?
- Inkpunks (Sam Sykes) on Serious Thoughts for Serious People.
Shadow Unit: Anomalous Crimes Season 1, Book 1 edited by Emma Bull, Elizabeth Bear
Chatty Fiction: “At a Loss”
I wrote and edited over 12 000 words this last month working on Marvel Heroic Roleplaying supplements and material for my Seminars. That meant I spent a lot less time gaming and thus had less things to discuss on the blog. Yet, I did write a lot though. I do love to blog about what I do. Thus I decided that I could afford to bring a slight change of focus over here and start blogging about writing a little more.
Today, I wrote my first piece of Flash Fiction. I don’t know if it’s any good, but I’m proud of it. It’s an idea that popped in my mind as I was telling myself I should try my hand at it as a writing exercise in between freelance assignment. It’s amazing how challenging it can be to try to say so much in so little.
So here it is, slightly longer than this intro. Enjoy and let me know if I should do more.
At A LossA story by Philippe-Antoine Ménard
“Genny, I can’t take this anymore.” You could hear the exasperation rise rapidly in his voice. “I love you, I really do, but all of this… It’s just too much for me.” His fists were clenching and unclenching repeatedly, his stress and anxiety showing more than usual.
“Please give me just one good reason why we should stay together.” He expected to hear none.
“I’m pregnant.” Genny’s gentle eyes were brimming with tears.
An adrenal bomb went off in his nerve-wracked body. “What the fuck? Are you shitting me?”
“I didn’t want to tell you… Given the circum…”
“Don’t you dare go there Gen!” he said, his face reddening by the second.
“He’s not yours!” she shouted back before he went on his usual rant.
“WHAT?”
Genny’s distraught face was wet with tears “I’m so sorry, he’s David’s…”
His boiling blood froze. Feelings of loss and guilt overwhelmed his heart. Genny reached for him, “Oh dearie I’m so sorry…”
He raised his hand, silencing her, taking a moment to anchor himself back to reality.
“There’s only one other in this world I’d trust to raise this child.” he said, “Genny, will you marry me?”
May 16, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Lightspeed (Jennifer Konieczny) interviews Kage Baker.
- Lightspeed (Robyn Lupo) interviews C.C. Finlay.
- Prime Books (Molly Tanzer) interviews Adam Callaway.
- John Scalzi's The Big Idea: Garth Nix.
- World SF Non-Western SF Roundtable (Part 2).
- The Functional Nerds interviews Jeff Patterson and Paul Weimer (podcast).
- The Skiffy and Fantasy Show interviews Pavarti K. Tyler (podcast).
- Sword and Laser episode 100 (podcast).
- Horror Writers Association Blog interviews Megan Hart.
Advice/Articles
- Janice Hardy on Forge Ahead: Ways to be a More Productive Writer, Part 4.
- Chuck Wendig on 25 Ways To Earn Your Audience.
- Lisa L. Hannett (Peter M. Ball) on Know Your Rights.
- Meilin Miranda (Cecilia Tan) on Long-term Relationships: Web serials and love.
- Book Life Now (Robert J. Bennett) on So what the hell is Urban Fantasy, anyway?
- Weird Fiction Review (Nancy Hightower) on When the Dead Speak, You Had Better Listen.
- Locus (Bryan Thao Worra) on Asian American SF Poetry.
News
- Strange Chemistry Signs Martha Wells in Two-Book Deal.
- The New York Review of Science Fiction Readings presents Charlie Jane Anders Brian Francis Slattery.
- Jay Kay Klein (1931-2012).
OOC 211: Casual Players - Threat or Menace?
You know that player. The one who sits in at the far end of the table, plays around on their phone, and occasionally throws the (sometimes wrong) dice when prompted. They never remember the rules, they aren't involved in any subplots, and they just bob along after the rest of the party. But when you ask them why they aren't engaged with the game, they respond, "Are you kidding? I'm having a blast!"
As casual gaming become more and more a part of our culture, many GMs face the challenge of creating a game that can appease both their casual and hardcore players. This week, Jason and the crew discuss their own experiences with casuals and the solutions they've found.
We'd also like to welcome Jonathan Strootman to the crew! Jonathan is the man behind Grok Bloodface's intimidating scowl. Go check out his work at the Tales of an Orc kickstarter page!
May 15, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Jim C. Hines interviews Karen Lord.
- World SF Blog Roundtable with Aliette de Bodard, Joyce Chng, Requires Hate, Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, and Ekaterina Sedia.
- Sword and Laser interviews Lev Grossman (video).
- Alma Katsu interviews Alethea Kontis.
- Dark Wolf's Fantasy Reviews interviews Chris F. Holm.
- Prime Books (Erin Stocks) interviews Maureen McHugh.
- SF Squeecast Episode 12 (podcast).
- I Should Be Writing interviews Peter V. Brett (podcast).
Advice/Articles
- Kate Elliott (Rochita Loenen-Ruiz) on Decolonizing as an SF Writer.
- Genreville (Rose Fox) on Crowdsourcing Recommended Reading (Asian-American literature).
- Cheryl Morgan on Coode Street, Campbell & Gender.
- International Speculative Fiction (Aleksandar Žiljak) on Science Fiction in Croatia.
- Book View Cafe (Ursula K. Le Guin) on The Narrative Gift as a Moral Conundrum.
- Chuck Wendig On The Privilege Of Being A Writer.
- Inkpunks (Wendy Wagner) on Add a little … character.
- Biyuti on Diaspora and the loss of language.
- Damien G. Walter on The Unspecified Reader.
- Bookworm Blues (Bryan Thomas Schmidt) on Special Needs in Strange Worlds.
- Bryan Thomas Schmidt on Outlining From A Finished Draft For Pantsers (How I Do It).
- The Guardian (Cory Doctorow) on Why the death of DRM would be good news for readers, writers and publishers.
- Juliette Wade on When do you give up or start over?
- Book Life Now (Cassie Alexander) on How To Find An Agent or Editor Without Making Yourself Insane.
- Omnivoracious (Susan J. Morris) on The Rule of Threes: Expressive Character Design.
News
- Ramsey Campbell – First Guest of Honor Confirmed for Bram Stoker Awards™ Weekend 2013.
- Angry Robot Now Recruiting – US-based Sales & Marketing Manager.
- 20th Century Fox Options Self-Published Novel.
- Charlaine Harris to End Sookie Stackhouse Series Next May.
May 14, 2012 Links and Plugs
Interviews and Profiles
- Tor.com (Jorge Aguirre and Rafael Rosado) interviews Raina Telgemeier.
- Odyssey Workshop interviews Barbara Ashford.
- The Coode St. Podcast with Jonathan Strahan and Gary K. Wolfe.
- Flames Rising interviews James L. Sutter.
- Book Life Now (Marcus Ewert) on Escaping Fight-or-Flight: Three Tricks for Sidestepping Writer’s Block.
- Inkpunks (Erika Holt) on Why do we write?
- Jeff VanderMeer on Entry Points into Fiction: Text Shows You How to Read It.
- The Qwillery (Lisa Renee Jones) on Creating a paranormal hero.
- Tor.com (Liz Bourke) on Sleeps With Monsters: Failure to Communicate (An Ongoing Problem).
News
The Moment of Change edited by Rose Lemberg
Why Every Group Should Play Maid RPG, Once
Two weekends ago I flew across the pond to Chicago to attend Anime Central, the third largest Japanese animation convention in the US. The convention has a surprisingly large tabletop games presence, with a whole corridor of conference rooms booked out for everything from Pathfinder RPG to Magic: the Gathering.
There’s a fair amount of overlap between fans of anime and tabletop RPGs, and nowhere is that overlap more direct than Maid: The Role-Playing Game. Japan has produced its own tabletop roleplaying games since at least as far back as the 1980s, but in 2008, Maid RPG was the first of those to see an official English translation.
It’s cartoonish, unpredictable, and sometimes—if you use the optional rules originally published in an expansion book—downright lewd. Critics have dubbed it “a joke RPG” and even the translator called Maid RPG a “goddamn weird game”.
And after some friends online convinced me to run a game over Google+, I wholeheartedly recommend that every D&D player and RPG designer play this game, at least once. Read on to find out why.
The Beast, the Robot and the Butler that Shouted or Maybe Didn’t Shout Love at the Heart of the WorldWhen Google+ opened in June 2011, I was eager to be one of the first to test its suitability for tabletop roleplaying games. My friends from the anime community were early adopters of Google+ and I asked what they’d like to play. I assumed they’d pick some variant of D&D, but a certain other RPG topped the votes instead.
The Japanese have nineteen different ways to say, “I guess it can’t be helped.”
To understand what the anime community thinks of when they hear “maid”, watch a few episodes of a series like Hayate the Combat Butler. A wealthy master lives in a modern-day mansion with a staff of maids and butlers, who keep up a Victorian-era style of dress and manner of service that doesn’t exist nowadays outside of TV series like Downton Abbey.
The maids must manage assault from two fronts: unbelievable threats to the mansion like giant robot attack, and the impossible whims of the mansion’s spoiled master. Fail on either front, and you’re fired.
This is the core story of Maid RPG.
Why you should play it, at least onceAnime isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but the hidden gem in Maid RPG is its simple, inobtrusive rules system.
It elegantly solves all kinds of problems that D&D players still struggle with. It’s beginner-friendly, but has enough optional complexity to keep players interested. Combat is quick, and rewards players for creativity and interesting character interactions.
The core gameplay, at least in the game as we played it, could be described as Paranoia meets Hayate the Combat Butler. Like Paranoia, the player characters are subject to the demands of a central NPC (the Computer in Paranoia, the Master in Maid RPG), and they compete with each other for his favour.
While nominally the maids are on the same side and must work together to fulfil the Master’s orders, in practice they’re rewarded individually and often arbitrarily, and sabotaging each other’s efforts is absolutely fair play. By the second session, my players were hiding their attributes and powers from each other, secretly poisoning food other characters made for the Master, and setting each other’s rooms on fire. At one point a PC literally decapitated another.
This brings me to one of Maid’s most excellent game mechanics. Instead of being killed and knocked out of the game when you accumulate too much damage, you suffer a “Stress Explosion”, a coping mechanism like “crying”, “alcohol” or “violence” which is randomly determined at character generation. For the duration of the Stress Explosion you cannot perform any action unless it somehow falls into the category of your Stress Explosion.
I utterly love this game mechanic, because instead of forcing you to sit the game out when you’re killed, you’re given the option to keep playing with a temporary setback that actually makes the game more interesting. What if all the bad guys are dead but you’ve still got ten minutes left on your “violence” Stress Explosion? Or how are you going to clean the mansion in time when all you can do for the next five minutes is “stealing”?
The core conflict resolution mechanic also rewards creative solutions. For any action contested by another player, you each roll 1d6 times any attribute that’s relevant to the action—say, Athletics for physical combat, or Skill for cooking. What counts as a “relevant attribute” is widely open to interpretation, and if you can describe to the GM’s liking how your character is winning a fist fight using housekeeping Skill to dump a barrel of laundry on the opponent, you can totally get away with it.
This is one of the great features of Maid RPG’s system: the player is rewarded for clever solutions, for imagination, and for interacting with the game world. There are no combat powers to pick from on your turn, so you’re free to decide your own actions intuitively instead of interacting with a thick layer of rules.
Another interesting game mechanic is the Random Event, where players can spend Favor (a limited XP-like resource) to roll on a random event table. This system has a lot of benefits: bored players can actually make something interesting happen, player characters in trouble can make a last ditch effort to escape, and players in general are given limited license to break free of the GM’s control of the game world.
Finally, as a system it’s approachable by newbies and veterans alike. Newcomers to RPGs will enjoy the lack of difficult choices in character creation (it’s entirely random) and in-game (there are few tactical options). There are no experience levels as such, so a new player can join an established campaign without a major penalty. It’s also very easy to learn: most of the 222-page book is optional rules, and the core rules could be condensed down to 20 pages, with most of that space taken up by the random character creation tables.
Is Maid RPG right for me?Some people won’t like Maid RPG. They’re not secure enough in their masculinity to roleplay a female character in a frilly dress. They’re put off by the unrealistic anime-style setting, or the sample play-through where somebody steals another maid’s underwear, or the strange optional rules that let maids roll to seduce the Master for bonus XP.
Everyone else, I encourage you to spend $6 and buy the PDF of Maid RPG and run it at least once, even if only as a gag game for a change from Dungeons & Dragons. The lessons it has to teach us about roleplaying with our imagination instead of our rulebooks are invaluable.
If you’re actually one of the anime fans in the target market for this game, you’ll appreciate the mountain of included bonus content originally published in expansion books: rules for butlers (for squeamish insecure players), pages of random event charts (including “Mansion blasts off into space and the setting is now Science Fiction”), special items, alternate costumes, alternate settings, rules for random generation of masters and mansions, and really inventive scenarios.
If that’s not your cup of tea, with a little work the rules could be re-purposed to another genre, perhaps science-fiction or action movies. Just don’t let anyone say you aren’t man enough to roleplay a maid.
May 11, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Treasured Tales for Young Adults interviews Alethea Kontis.
- Sense of Wonder interviews Verbena C.W.
- [SFFWRTCHT] A Chat with Writer/Con Expert/Toastmaster Susan E. Satterfield.
- Suvudu (Fictional Frontiers) interviews Scott Snyder (podcast).
- Suvudu (Shawn Speakman) interviews John Joseph Adams.
- Prime Bookos (Molly Tanzer) interviews Paul Park.
- Book Banter interviews Michelle Browser.
- Rob's Blog o' Stuff interviews Jack Campbell.
- Galactic Suburbia Episode 59 (podcast).
- Fantasy Hrvatska interviews Cheryl Morgan (video).
Advice/Articles
- Justine Larbalestier on You don’t have to read my books.
- The Intern on Publishers Weekly: The Deals You Don't See.
- Chuck Wendig On The General Weirdness Of Having “Fans”.
- Time (Lev Grossman) on Confessions of (Another) Book Reviewer.
- The Functional Nerds (Samuel Montgomery-Blinn) on Rediscover (or discover for the first time) the works of Diana Wynne Jones — in audio.
- The Guardian (Alison Flood) on Can a fictional character take you over?
- Missions Unknown (Scott A. Cupp) on Forgotten Book: Mythago Wood.
- Tor.com (Jorge Aguirre and Rafael Rosado) on Making the Ordinary Meet the Extraordinary With Piers Anthony.
- Strange Chemistry on New YA Releases for May 2012.
- Weird Fiction Review (Stephen Graham Jones) on Flow Chart of the Damned.
- Seanan McGuire on Why can't I buy ebook X outside of the US? Revisiting the territory question.
- Jim C. Hines on Criticizing our Fandoms.
News
Enchanted by Alethea Kontis
May 10, 2012 Links and Plugs
- The Enchanted Inkpot (Leah Cypess) interviews Alethea Kontis.
- Lightspeed (Robyn Lupo) interviews Nicola Griffith.
- Lightspeed (Erin Stocks) interviews Catherynne M. Valente.
- Civilian Reader interviews Stina Leicht.
- Bryan Thomas Schmidt profiles Jaleta Clegg.
- Far Beyond Reality interviews Lev Grossman.
- John Scalzi's The Big Idea: Mark Teppo.
- Weird Fiction Review (Jeff VanderMeer) on Amos Tutuola: An Interview with Yinka Tutuola.
- Weird Fiction Review (Gio Clairval) profiles Georg Heym.
- Jim C. Hines interviews Stina Leicht.
- The King of Elfland's Second Cousin on eBooks and the Death and Ongoing Life of Genre.
- Rachelle Gardner on 9 Ways to Outwit Writer’s Block.
- Storytellers Unplugged (Brian Hodge) on 5 Undying Myths About Published Writers And Their Eerie Powers.
- Juliette Wade on High Culture versus Low Culture (Daily Practices): A worldbuilding hangout report.
- Chuck Wendig on Thinking About Stories.
- Inkpunks (Evan Jensen) on Workspace.
- Book Life Now (Larry D. Sweazy) on Buying Books That Are Finished.
- The Guardian (Damien G. Walter) on Fandom matters: writers must respect their followers or pay with their careers.
- Locus (Mike Allen) on Let us go then, you and I: an introduction to speculative poetry.
- Suvudu (Matt Staggs) on What's Weird, Jeff VanderMeer?
News
Flora's Fury by Ysabeau S. Wilce
May 9, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Tor.com (Jorge Aguirre and Rafael Rosado) interview Vera Brosgol.
- John Scalzi's The Big Idea: Alethea Kontis.
- Prime Books (Erin Stocks) interviews Naomi Novik.
- The Functional Nerds interviews Stina Leicht and Chris Holm (podcast).
- Sword and Laser interviews Erik Bear, Joseph Brassey, E.D deBirmingham, Cooper Moo, Neal Stephenson, and Mark Teppo (video).
- Speculate! discusses Rob Ziegler (podcast).
- Fantasy Literature (Marion Deeds) interviews Robert Jackson Bennett.
- Black Gate (Patty Templeton) interviews Myke Cole.
Advice/Articles
- Lisa L. Hannett (Jack Dann) on A Few Keys to the Kingdom.
- Chuck Wendig on 25 Things Writers Should Know About Creating Mystery.
- Sean Wallace on Spreadsheet: Online Semipro, Spreadsheets: Professional Online Genre Magazine.
- Cat Valente on Too Smart for Kids: A Promise to the Readers of Fairyland.
- The Rejectionist on Some Things To Do Instead of Working On Your Book: A Helpful Task List.
- Book Life Now (Jaym Gates) on It Never Rains But It Pours: Boosting Your Signal In A Saturated Market.
- Malinda Lo on The books I come from.
- io9 (Charlie Jane Anders and Kaila Hale-Stern) on Science Fiction and Fantasy Books You Can’t Afford to Miss in May.
- Cheryl Morgan on Africa in Science Fiction – The Exhibition.
- Aliette de Bodard on SFF as metaphor: aliens, vampires, foreigners and immigrants.
The Weird edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer
OOC 210: Chaotic Neutral Blues
It was cute the first time she slew the princess and saved the dragon. You all laughed when he decided to kiss the villain right on the face. But the antics are getting out of hand, you haven't seen the plot in a month, and you'd really like to work for a king once in a while without Captain Fruitloops attempting an impromptu assassination or showing up to the banquet naked.
How do you manage "the crazy character" in your group? How can they become problematic? How can you channel their shenanigans into a net positive? And at what point do you have to issue an ultimatum?
We'd like to thank Stephanie Pegg of Flying Monkeys for this week's question. Be sure to check out their game, Super Sparkle Action Princess GX!
May 8, 2012 Links and Plugs
- HWA (Ron Breznay) interviews Christopher Conlon.
Advice/Articles
- Omnivoracious (Susan J. Morris) on Give It to Me Straight: The Cardinal Rules of Critiquing for Writers.
- Rachelle Gardner on What If My Agent Doesn’t Like My Next Book?
- The Enchanted Inkpot (Ellen Booraem) on Spring YA fantasy covers take wing!
- Bryan Thomas Schmidt on How To Check The Ego & Be A Better Artistic Citizen With Fellow Creatives.
- Read This Book Dammit on Best Fantasy for Pre-Teens.
- Juliette Wade on Managing and prioritizing multiple writing projects.
- Clarion Blog (Michèle Laframboise) on My Big Fat First Novel.
- Fantasy-Faction (Paolo Chikiamco) on World Tour of Wonderment: The Philippines – Part Two.
- Tor.com (Ryan Britt) on 5 Things You Didn’t Know About the Original Ghostbusters.
- Inkpunks (Wendy Wagner) on Feedback, please!
- Weird Fiction Review (Ann & Jeff VanderMeer) on The Weird: An Introduction and The Weird: Approaches and Foci.
- Paul S. Kemp on A Nomenclature of Book Reviewers.
- Lynne M. Thomas (Tansy Rayner Roberts) on What Epic Fantasy Could Learn From Batman.
- Richard Parks on Five Things I Wish I’d Known Then.
News
How to Flirt in Faerieland & Other Wild Rhymes by C.S.E. Cooney.
May 7, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Small Beer Podcast interviews John Kessel.
- Erin Underwood interviews Tracy L. Carbone.
- The Boston Globe (Amy Sutherland) interviews Paul Krugman.
Advice/Articles
- Charlie Stross on The death of genre.
- Alisa Krasnostein On gender breakdowns of awards lists.
- Cheryl Morgan on Africa in SF – The Prequel.
- The Cogsmith on Why is Diversity Important?
- Inkpunks (Morgan Dempsey) on First Person POV and Developing Other Characters.
News
War & Space: Recent Combat edited by Rich Horton and Sean Wallace
May 4, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Broadly Speaking interviews Andrea Hairston, Shira Lipkin, and Cat Rambo (podcast).
- Keith Brooke interviews TC McCarthy.
- Prime Books (Jennifer Konieczny) interviews Marissa Lingen.
- Jim C. Hines interviews E. Lily Yu.
- Solo Sound interviews Michael Stackpole (podcast).
- Bryan Thomas Schmidt interviews Selene O'Rourke.
- John Scalzi's The Big Idea: Paolo Bacigalupi.
- Sense of Wonder interviews Marty Halpern.
- [SFFWRTCHT] A Chat With ConQuest Planners John Platt, Victoria L’Ecuyer and KacSFFS President Diana J. Bailey.
- I Should Be Writing interviews Peter V. Brett (podcast).
- Guardian Books podcast interviews Jane Rogers.
- David B. Coe interviews Alethea Kontis.
Advice/Articles
- Kristine Kathryn Rusch on The Business Rusch: Royalty Statement Update 2012.
- The John Carter Files on Edgar Rice Burroughs in 1930 on “The Purpose of Entertainment Fiction”.
- Ranker on 25 Animals Wearing Star Wars Costumes.
- Book View Cafe (Lois H. Gresh) on Best Bond Gadgets.
- Locus (Cory Doctorow) on A Prose By Any Other Name.
News
- Apex Publishing seeks blog editor.
- 2012 Seiun nominees announced.
- Schmidt Wins 2012 Robert A. Heinlein Award.
May 3, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Civilian Reader interviews Madeline Ashby.
- Tracie Welser interviews Nicola Griffith.
- Curiouser and Curioser interviews Stephen Graham Jones.
- The Qwillery interviews Jenn Bennett.
- Geek's Guide to the Galaxy interviews Garth Nix (podcast).
- Prime Books (Jennifer Konieczny) interviews Chris Lawson.
- John Scalzi's The Big Idea: N.K. Jemisin.
- The Enchanted Inkpot (Deva Fagan) interviews Zoë Marriott.
- The Guilded Earlobe interviews Mainak Dhar.
Advice/Articles
- The King of Elfland's Second Cousin on Where lie the borders between Voice and Style?
- Kirstyn McDermott on Girls and Consequences.
- AMC Film Critic (John Scalzi) on 9 Scifi Films You Should See That You (Probably) Haven't.
- Kat Howard on Overnight success, thousands of nights in the making.
- ACM Blog on Top Ten Reasons We Can't Get Enough The Matrix.
- Inkpunks (Amy Sundberg) on The Five Stages of Submission.
- Outer Alliance (Brit Mandelo) on Beyond Binary and We Wuz Pushed.
- Omnivoracious (Seira Wilson) interviews Kristin Cashore and Richelle Mead.
- Black Gate (C.S.E. Cooney) on Snarky Female Protagonists and Why I Read Them.
News
Queen of Kings by Maria Dahvana Headley
May 2, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Weird Fiction Review (Jeff VanderMeer) interviews Kathe Koja.
- The SFFWRTCHT Interview: Alethea Kontis.
- Apex (Maggie Slater) interviews Rachel Swirsky.
- Prime Books (Andrew Liptak) interviews Alexandra Duncan.
- Jim C. Hines interviews Mur Lafferty.
- Lightspeed (Andrew Liptak) interviews Dale Bailey.
- Lightspeed (Erin Stocks) interviews Linda Nagata.
- Janet Reid interviews Laird Barron.
Advice/Articles
- Conceptual Fiction (Ted Goia) on A.E. van Vogt.
- Stroppy Author on A view from the bridge (2): Rejections.
- Chuck Wendig on 25 Realizations Writers Need To Have.
- Graham Edwards on Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Star Trek III.
- Small Beer Press on Why print on demand isn’t right for us right now.
- Book Life Now (Steve Scearce) on The Writer’s Toolkit: Almost Everything You Need to get the Story Started.
- Locus Roundtable on ::ahem:: Non-Western SF.
News
The Drowned Cities by Paolo Bacigalupi
April 30, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Nicola Griffith interviews Brit Mandelo (part 3).
- Neil Gaiman interviews Stephen King.
- The Agony Column SF in SF Panel Discussion Moderated by Terry Bisson and Interviews with Rudy Rucker, K. W. Jeter, and Jay Lake. Interviews with Rudy Rucker, K.W. Jeter, Jay Lake.
- Jim C. Hines interviews Brad Torgersen.
- Bibliomancy interviews Quentin S. Crisp.
- Adventures in SciFi Publishing interviews D.T. Conklin and Lane Diamond.
- Fantasy-Faction (Paolo Chikiamco) World Tour of Wonderment: The Philippines – Part One.
- Janice Hardy on Real Life Diagnostics: Show Me the Details: Showing in a Distant Third Person.
- Wet Asphalt (Eric Rosenfield) on A Taxonomy of Recently Published Speculative Fiction Short Stories.
- Kate Elliott on Looking for women in historically-based fantasy worlds.
Beyond Binary: Genderqueer and Sexually Fluid Speculative Fiction edited by Brit Mandelo
OOC 209: Background Check, Part II
We switch up a few seats and finish our discussion on character backgrounds. This week: How much physical description is a good idea, or is it necessary at all? How do you build personal goals for your characters, and how do you keep them aligned with the main plotline? What do you do with NPCs related to the player characters? And more!
May 1, 2012 Links and Plugs
- Lisa L. Hannett (and Angela Slatter) interview Kirstyn McDermott.
- Tje Register Guard profiles Kate Wilhelm.
- Publishers Weekly (Lenny Picker) chats with Alastair Reynolds.
- Fantasy Book Critic chat with Bradley P. Beaulieu & Rob Ziegler.
- Underwire (Adam Rogers) interviews Joss Whedon.
- Lawrence M. Schoen interviews Will McIntosh.
- Suvudu (Matt Staggs) Take Five with Peter David.
- Omnivoracious (Susan J. Morris) on Mood Killers: Four Book-Throwing Offenses (and How to Avoid Them).
- The World SF Blog (Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Gabriel Trujillo-Muñoz) on Mexican Science Fiction: The Northern Corridor.
- Janice Hardy on Don't Finish: Ways to be a More Productive Writer, Part 3.
- Book View Cafe (Sherwood Smith) on Cross Gender Writing Revisited.
- Malinda Lo on Writing About Kissing.
- Kotaku on The Game of Thrones Minecraft Project Is Getting More And More Spectacular.
- Juliette Wade on What's in a "strong female character"?
- Clarion (Justine Graykin) on The Perils of the Writer Group.
- io9 (Cyriaque Lamar and Charlie Jane Anders) on Top 10 Albums Every Self-Respecting Science Fiction Fan Should Own.
- Book Life Now (Erik Scott de Bie) on What You Need to Know about Shared Worlds.
- Richard Parks on Time for Some Name-Calling.
- Norma K Hemming Award Shortlist.
- Strange Horizons Welcomes Julia Rios.
- HWA to Host WHC 2013.
- WINSFA Announces New van Vogt Award.
Roleplaying in the Secret History of...
In a homebrewed fantasy setting, this sort of thing is difficult. Players won't have the established knowledge to make such things meaningful to them. Telling them facts or expecting them to read up on histories you've written is unlikely to be effective. This can be accomplished more effectively if the characters care about the historical facts in question. I need to think about how to do this most effectively.
Still, this is one of the best uses I can think of for long-established campaign settings. With the right group of players, running a campaign around secret histories set in Greyhawk or the Forgotten Realms or Tekumel... or even Middle Earth... would be simple... and could be incredibly compelling.
Thinking about it, there are a lot of classic D&D adventures that could really be recast in this light - many of them are centered around ancient tombs of historically-important individuals. Reworking them might largely be a matter of tone and objective.
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