Previous Topics

9/26/2001 Zak Arntson: Indie Gaming - Red Box D&D
Okay, so our Sunday Indie Gaming went a little odd this weekend. I had to step out while the gang played Chez Geek ... One of our players had never…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ben Morgan, J B Bell, Bankuei, Jared A. Sorensen, Clinton R. Nixon.

9/17/2001 Zak Arntson: Inspectres w/ Clinton & Justin
Okay, just played Inspectres last night with Clinton (of the Forge) and Justin (2nd time playing an RPG ever, and he's good at it!) ... Setup: Character creation went smoothly,…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards.

9/11/2001 Zak Arntson: I am a Sports Hero - Freebie RPG
[H3][A HREF="http://zaknet.tripod.com/hmouse/games/sports.html"]I am a Sports Hero[/A][/H3] "roleplaying one of the worst comic ideas ever" This game is all about playing a Sports-based superhero. Which is about the suckiest[SUP]1[/SUP] ideas ever.…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Matt Gwinn, Jared A. Sorensen, Clinton R. Nixon, Jack Spencer Jr.

9/10/2001 Zak Arntson: Elfs - First game tonight!!
Okay, Clinton came over to play some Elfs. So I figure, what the hell. We're playing Elfs so all bets are off. So anyhow, I drank way too much (having…
In Adept Press
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards, Clinton R. Nixon.

9/2/2001 Zak Arntson: the Jon Morris Sketchbuk Roleplaying Game - Freebie RPG
[H3][A HREF="http://zaknet.tripod.com/hmouse/games/sketchbuk.html"]the Jon Morris Sketchbuk Roleplaying Game[/A][/H3] Just finished my newest roleplaying game, based on the freaky art by Jon Morris at http://www.ape-law.com. It's a beer & pretzels affair with…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards, James V. West.

8/29/2001 Zak Arntson: Clerks - Sorcerer Style
Okay, saw Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back the day after I read my Sorcerer book ... So ... has anyone run Sorcerer with a comedic bent? I can imagine…
In Adept Press
Participants: Zak Arntson, Time, Ron Edwards.

8/23/2001 Zak Arntson: Adventures in Space!! - Freebie RPG
http://zaknet.tripod.com/hmouse/games/ais.html Okay, I've put my newest game up. It's for playing in those cheezy space serials/comics. Main drive behind game: Players should have a large part in driving the story,…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, FilthySuperman, Cadriel, Ron Edwards.

8/23/2001 Zak Arntson: Premise vs. Convention
For those of you emulating a particular genre, I would recommend following that genre versus established RPG conventions. Snippet from an interview about the upcoming Lord of the Rings RPG…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Jared A. Sorensen.

8/16/2001 Zak Arntson: What Kids Say
I don't know if this is really good for Little Fears (not having bought the game yet ... soon I promise! :) ... but I've got a niece that says…
In Key 20 Publishing
Participants: Zak Arntson, Balazs, FilthySuperman, delirium.

6/26/2001 Zak Arntson: Sorcerer & Sword
Okay, I got my über-copy of Sorcerer. And I can say that Sorcerer & Sword rocks the entire combined worlds that make up my rump. So much so that I…
In Adept Press
Participants: Zak Arntson, Supplanter, joshua neff, Ron Edwards, Uncle Dark, greyorm, Paul Czege, Blake Hutchins, Clay.

6/25/2001 Zak Arntson: Dying Earth
None of our group has posted about this yet, and somebody's got to let the Forge know. I played Dying Earth with Clinton Nixon gming, and two other guys playing…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Jared A. Sorensen, Mytholder, Clinton R. Nixon, james_west, Blake Hutchins.

6/22/2001 Zak Arntson: Presentation and Design Goals
Okay, I'm moving this D&D discussion to Game Design from Actual Play because I think it's a design-level issue. I am going to concentrate on Presentation. For most games, Presentation…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, james_west, JSDiamond.

6/21/2001 Zak Arntson: Why D&D will never leave Hack -n- Slash
Played D&D again tonight. Here's an observation. Using the search time concept, I believe that D&D will never become a good system for non-dungeon crawling (i.e., search for traps, get…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Gordon C. Landis, hardcoremoose, jburneko, Peter, Ron Edwards, Ian O'Rourke, greyorm, Jared A. Sorensen.

6/10/2001 Zak Arntson: Freebie RPG: Chthonian
Okay, spurred by D&D -] Disposable Characters -] Call of Cthulhu -] CoC done "right" (read: Narrative) ... Props (mad even) to Jared for giving me the bug to write…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Jared A. Sorensen, Paul Czege.

5/31/2001 Zak Arntson: D&D
Okay, guess what I just played ... But, it went okay. There's a bunch of newer players (including the DM) who seem to be pretty happy with learning the game,…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards, hardcoremoose, Clay, Mike Holmes, greyorm, Paul Czege, Jared A. Sorensen.

5/30/2001 Zak Arntson: Players playing Demons
(Dragging an idea over from the ever-fraying Zombie Squirrel thread) I don't have the Sorcerer book (hopefully this weekend), but does it discuss each player playing their character and another…
In Adept Press
Participants: Zak Arntson, greyorm, Dav, Ron Edwards, Clinton R. Nixon, Clay.

5/27/2001 Zak Arntson: Freebie RPG: Courts & Corsets
After watching Amadeus (and being a fan of those effeminate costume dramas in general), I thought about writing an RPG that recreates the intrigue-filled life of those characters. I thought…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Damocles, Paul Czege.

5/24/2001 Zak Arntson: Simulate vs. Explore
Here is my take on Simulation vs. Exploration. Simulation holds the weight that "Sim" does as a prefix to video games. SimAnt, for example, handles anthills _NOT_ realistically, but with…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Zak Arntson, Jared A. Sorensen, Valamir, Ron Edwards, Mike Holmes, greyorm.

5/21/2001 Zak Arntson: RPG System for Kids
I take in a 7 and 10 year old every few weekends, and try to get some roleplaying into them. Not only is it fun to play with kids, but…
In Actual Play
Participants: Zak Arntson, james_west, Ron Edwards, greyorm, GreatWolf.

5/17/2001 Zak Arntson: Login not working
Whenever I click on the Login, and enter teh correct information, I get the regular forum screen but the "user not logged in" appears. I went and tested it a…
In Site Discussion
Participants: Zak Arntson, joshua neff, Ron Edwards, Dav, GreatWolf, Clay, Clinton R. Nixon.

<< more previous topics

Subsequent Topics

10/19/2001 Zak Arntson: How to Design a Bad Game
Okay, as you can see from my Harlekin-Maus site, I design short games. Usually with a ridiculous Premise (for a serious Premise, wait for my Chthonian redux). So, a short…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Mike Holmes, Jason L Blair, unodiablo.

11/1/2001 Zak Arntson: SLURPS - Harlekin-Maus Monthly RPG
[H3][A HREF="http://zaknet.tripod.com/hmouse/"]SLURPS[/A][/H3] This the Simplest Little Unitarian Role Playing System. This one's kind of hard to explain. What if you played a Character [I]and[/I] the manifestation of your Character's monotheism?…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Matt.

11/7/2001 Zak Arntson: Call for Probability Formulas
Okay, this was spurred by numerous questions (a few on here, tons on rpg.net) about dice probabilities. Is there some way we can just collect a bunch of formulas and…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Don Lag, Mike Holmes, kwill.

11/9/2001 Zak Arntson: Superpets - Preliminary Game Design
[A HREF="http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?itemid=14709655"]Superpets[/A] It's in the LiveJournal phase, which is somewhere between Idea & Initial Notes and Harlekin-Maus Freebie. So now is the best time to provide input. It's a simple…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson.

11/13/2001 Zak Arntson: Fungeon - GMless Dungeon Crawling (Preliminary Design)
Okay, over at livejournal, I've put up a sneaky peek at Fungeon. http://www.livejournal.com/talkread.bml?itemid=15027185 Simple currency, Room by Room play, resolution builds in a fun way of narrating events. In a…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Jared A. Sorensen, Mike Holmes, Nathan.

11/16/2001 Zak Arntson: Chill Companion - Worth Buying?
I've heard that the old Chill (with the crazy covers) is an amazing product, especially it's sense of horror. I saw the Chill Companion book at the store, by Ray…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, hardcoremoose, Ron Edwards.

11/24/2001 Zak Arntson: Fungeon - Secret Webpage
Okay, I've since hammered out the Preliminary Game design (thanks, Mike!), and put the thing up at a webpage. I haven't linked to it from my main site, so it's…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, xiombarg, James V. West.

12/1/2001 Zak Arntson: Superpets - Harlekin-Maus November RPG
[A HREF="http://zaknet.tripod.com/hmouse/index.html"]Superpets[/A] The RPG of Animal Super Heroes, with pictures! Indie Game Design notes: * Check out the forceful use of Fortune in the Beginning and a single narrator for…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, lumpley, Mike Holmes.

12/7/2001 Zak Arntson: Successful RPG Line
In another thread (http://indie-rpgs.com/forum/viewtopic.php?topic=972&forum=4&4), Ron Edwards sez, The common plan of releasing supplements which are both (a) setting details and (b) metaplot continuance does NOT, ultimately, serve a…
In Publishing
Participants: Zak Arntson, Nathan, Le Joueur, Joe Murphy (Broin), JSDiamond, Ron Edwards, Dav, Paul Czege, mearls, Mike Holmes, Clinton R. Nixon, GMSkarka, Jack Spencer Jr, Ian O'Rourke, Anon LeBlanc, Ryan Ary.

12/10/2001 Zak Arntson: Robot GNS - Preliminary Design
Okay, I wrote an RPG about Robots. Well, I wrote 3 of them. I tried to carry them along the lines of GNS, just to see how it would work.…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson.

12/27/2001 Zak Arntson: Preliminary Design - Gamist Cubes & Narrativist Fate
Two different game ideas: Cubes Competitive roleplaying corporate drones, a la Office Space (the movie). I wanted a game that uses cards, is competitive, and a commentary on my…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Clinton R. Nixon.

12/31/2001 Zak Arntson: Harlekin-Maus monthly: Fungeon
I'm officially releasing my GM-less Dungeon Crawling game. Fungeon The holidays kicked me upside the head, so I wasn't able to make it super-amazing by the end of the…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, James V. West.

1/4/2002 Zak Arntson: One-Shot Gaming
I've been thinking about the way our (about to be rekindled) group plays games, and the intent is to play a single indie game for a weekend or two. Thing…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, unodiablo, Mike Holmes, Paul Czege, Julian Kelsey, Garbanzo, hardcoremoose, James V. West.

1/9/2002 Zak Arntson: www.harlekin-maus.com
Okay, the only way I can justify posting basically an ad ... is that I'm taking down my old site and putting it up (with some revamping) at www.harlekin-maus.com…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson.

1/11/2002 Zak Arntson: S&S Praise & semi-Actual Play
First off, huge amounts of props (prizops, even) go to you, Ron. I got Sorcerer & Sword from my mother on Christmas (!!), and immediately began reading the thing. It's…
In Adept Press
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards, Clay.

1/15/2002 Zak Arntson: D/F/K and the Unknown Factor
I've been thinking about mechanics for some time now. I'm trying to come up with a good vocabulary for working out systems in games. This applies only to rpgs with…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Zak Arntson, Bankuei, Garbanzo, Epoch.

1/16/2002 Zak Arntson: Harlekin-Maus monthly: Cubes
Roleplaying at the office. Cubes Game design notes: This game came in a flash. I was really sick of work, so I wrote a quickie on Cubes (you can…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, contracycle.

1/23/2002 Zak Arntson: Operant Conditioning & RPG System
Okay, my wife has a degree in Psych, so I've got a layman's view of the field. I've often thought about how gambling psychology plays into video games: The most…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Zak Arntson, hardcoremoose, Bankuei, J B Bell, Le Joueur, Laurel, Blake Hutchins, Ron Edwards.

2/2/2002 Zak Arntson: Divine Right - Harlekin-Maus Monthly
Okay, I've put up February's game: Divine Right. It was originally about exorcists, but then the basic Premise, "What would you sacrifice to save another," kept sticking in my…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Ron Edwards, Fabrice G..

2/20/2002 Zak Arntson: In-Progress - Alien Descent Team
Talking with Clinton about a space-age Donjon (which might become my Donjon supplement, we'll see), coupled with an inspiring mention from Jon Morris (of Ape-Law) about "Alien school", and…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Zak Arntson, Bailywolf, Jared A. Sorensen, Ron Edwards, Garbanzo.

more subsequent topics >>