Previous Topics

1/30/2004 Ben Lehman: The Roots of Sim (Response to Nar Essay)
Note that this is, in no way, a response to the entireity of the remarkably in-depth essay that Ron just posted, which will probably take months to digest. Rather, it…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, Ron Edwards, lumpley, John Kim, xiombarg, Gordon C. Landis, Bankuei, Uzzah, Calithena, talysman, james_west, Caldis, clehrich, Sean, epweissengruber, Silmenume, M. J. Young, cruciel, charles ferguson.

1/19/2004 Ben Lehman: Toss and Bind
Hey. I noticed something the other day -- no one in my group ever uses the Toss or Bind maneuvers. Curious, I looked at the manuevers to refresh myself and...…
In The Riddle of Steel
Participants: Ben Lehman, Deacon Blues, Trevis Martin, Jake Norwood, Merritt Baggett, Wolfen, Paganini, Overdrive, Mokkurkalfe, Spartan.

12/18/2003 Ben Lehman: Assorted Questions of Demon Abilities
So, I'm running a game of Sorcerer (Charnel Gods brew) and I had some questions about demon abilities. First of all, all the demons (save one) are incapable of independent…
In Adept Press
Participants: Ben Lehman, Ron Edwards, Valamir.

12/17/2003 Ben Lehman: Tactics: Mechanics
For a discussion of responsibility management and group challenge, as well as an introduction to the game design goals, please see the previous thread for Tactics: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=8551&highlight= In this thread…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Ben Lehman, Dev, LordSmerf.

12/10/2003 Ben Lehman: Charnel Gods
"Escape the sorrow and restraint of mortal cities..." (If you are one of my players for this game, please don't read. It will spoil some surprise.) Hi all-- I'm prepping…
In Actual Play
Participants: Ben Lehman, hardcoremoose, Valamir, Ron Edwards.

12/4/2003 Ben Lehman: Chorus d20
Hi all-- This is a post about a 1-shot game I ran recently for two of my gaming friends from Providence (both part of Brown's Gaming group, but neither --…
In Actual Play
Participants: Ben Lehman, Russell Hoyle.

11/18/2003 Ben Lehman: Exploration and Creative Agenda
I have been following with great interest the recent spate of threads about the overall structure of Ron Edward's General Role-Playing Theory. These are, in general, very useful threads, in…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, Alan, Ron Edwards, pete_darby, Valamir, Mike Holmes, Gordon C. Landis.

11/12/2003 Ben Lehman: Mainstream?
I am writing this from a hip little Internet cafe near my house, where RIGHT NOW on television (okay, it's in an ad break) two personalities on an ESPN talk…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Ben Lehman.

11/7/2003 Ben Lehman: Gamist Characteristics
Hi. I've been doing a lot of thought recently into the methods and modes of Gamism, largely to help me with the design of Tactics. I thought I would…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, Mike Holmes, Ron Edwards, Rich Forest, fusangite, pete_darby, contracycle, Walt Freitag.

11/2/2003 Ben Lehman: The Tactics Project
Hi everyone -- I am working on a group-oriented tactical quasi-RPG which is going by the working title "Tactics." The goal is to have a simple, sustainable tactical RPG (or…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Ben Lehman, LordSmerf, Emily Care, Dev, Rich Forest, Ace Pumpkin.

10/20/2003 Ben Lehman: My Life with Imperator
Has anyone considered the possibility of using the My Life With Master mechanics for the Nobilis setting? This idea came to me in the shower this morning, and I think…
In Half Meme Press
Participants: Ben Lehman, Jonathan Walton, Michael S. Miller.

10/16/2003 Ben Lehman: A Shot in the Dark
So, I'm planning on expanding on "Over the Bar --" the ultralite "bar game" that I laid out in this thread. A more complete version is available via PM. http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=8163…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Ben Lehman, Mike Holmes, Tim Alexander, Valamir, failrate.

10/7/2003 Ben Lehman: Stretching
This post is a little off the wall, but I've been stretching Sorcerer inside my head recently, and I've come up with an "interpretation" which I find interesting enough to…
In Adept Press
Participants: Ben Lehman, Mike Holmes, Ron Edwards, sirogit, AnyaTheBlue.

9/30/2003 Ben Lehman: Small Game Help Wanted
So I typed up my bar game, Over the Bar, as a Microsoft Word file, and found that it fits nicely on an 8.5x11 sheet of paper, with room…
In Connections
Participants: Ben Lehman, Ron Edwards, RaconteurX.

9/29/2003 Ben Lehman: Humor in RPGs / Comedy RPGs
(Not certain if this should be in RPG Theory or GNS... It relates to RPG theory, but also to GNS...) Something which I have harped on for a while in…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Ben Lehman, AnyaTheBlue, xiombarg, Ron Edwards, jdagna, Gordon C. Landis, M. J. Young.

9/24/2003 Ben Lehman: Struggle in RPGs
This is entirely based on this thread: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=8092 So I was thinking about the "Vanilla Simulationists" mentioned in this thread with regard to my own experiences with highly immersionist play…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, Matt Wilson, Ron Edwards, pete_darby, AnyaTheBlue, contracycle, Ian Charvill, Landon Darkwood.

9/22/2003 Ben Lehman: relationship maps as S technique
For clarification, I see most of my games as S / N overlapping -- strong exploration of setting and character and no-collusion actor stance play with strong setting based premise…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, hanschristianandersen, Gordon C. Landis, jdagna, M. J. Young, John Kim, Ron Edwards.

9/22/2003 Ben Lehman: Setting Design Technique: N or S
So, as I further try to get a handle on these terms, I'm going to ask about the way that I tend to design settings for RPGs. I will note…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, Ron Edwards.

9/9/2003 Ben Lehman: Sorcerer Gedankensetting
Yes, I'm going to get back to work on 15 minutes one of these days. I've been drowning in work. However, Chris K's quote, below (from the thread in RPG…
In Adept Press
Participants: Ben Lehman, Lxndr, Ron Edwards, Cemendur, AnyaTheBlue.

9/3/2003 Ben Lehman: [split] Imbedded in Sim play is...
split from http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=7819 I plan to spend a fair amount of time talking about how play/design in this category is extremely vulnerable to Narrativist powergaming (which is basically…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, WDFlores, gentrification, contracycle, Ron Edwards, Tony Irwin, Jack Spencer Jr, Wormwood.

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Subsequent Topics

2/21/2004 Ben Lehman: Demons and Preservation
I don't like the way that Preservation, as a demonic power, works. It seems counter-intuitive to everything else in the system, which is all about throwing extra dice down on…
In lumpley games
Participants: Ben Lehman, lumpley.

2/22/2004 Ben Lehman: Exclusivity of Creative Agenda
Yo. To people who have been around for a while, I apologize. I've brought this up before, and this is spurred by some recent conversations with another friend (hi, Dave!)…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, Jinx, Jack Spencer Jr, Paganini, Ron Edwards, Eero Tuovinen, james_west, M. J. Young, Ian Charvill, Emily Care, Mike Holmes.

2/23/2004 Ben Lehman: Thieves and Kings 2
As a flaming T&K fanboy, I need to answer this old thread. But Quinton ... this is a character who breaks most role-playing conventions of "story" and "protagonist"…
In Adept Press
Participants: Ben Lehman, Ron Edwards.

2/23/2004 Ben Lehman: [Zero at the Bone] The worst thing
My major problem with the game is the opposite of Jesse's -- I've known some people who have done some very awful things, and thus one person is in the…
In Adept Press
Participants: Ben Lehman, Ron Edwards.

2/24/2004 Ben Lehman: Ceremonies
Okay, the Ceremonies, at present, need work. A *lot* of work. I think that the change of ceremony to Trait from Conflict is a good one, but there are some…
In lumpley games
Participants: Ben Lehman, bluegargantua, lumpley.

2/24/2004 Ben Lehman: Scene Entrance
So, say that Bob is over there, in some other scene across town, and he is suddenly doing something really cool that totally applies to my character and I want…
In lumpley games
Participants: Ben Lehman, lumpley.

2/25/2004 Ben Lehman: d4 traits and Fallout
More issues-- In fallout, you are given a choice from a list of options. This is Cool and Good, and needs to stay around. However, given that d4 traits only…
In lumpley games
Participants: Ben Lehman, lumpley, bluegargantua, nikola.

2/29/2004 Ben Lehman: A RPG of Heroic Passion
Hey everybody. So I had some free time today, and sat down to work on Tactics (minutia of movement rules... joy!) Instead, this came out, nearly whole cloth, in about…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Ben Lehman, james_west, Jeph.

3/26/2004 Ben Lehman: Tactics: Antagonist Bidding
Previous Threads on this game: http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=8551 http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=9041 So, after some long agonizing over the virtues of varying levels of "GMless" play, I have decided the following things: 1) If it…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Ben Lehman, Mike Holmes, Dev.

4/4/2004 Ben Lehman: The Necromancer Stirs...
Awakening from within his foul lair, he calls upon the ancient demon-lords of administration -- bound long ago into the Forge of time, and presents them with offerings of bones,…
In Forge Birthday Forum
Participants: Ben Lehman, Ron Edwards, Mike Holmes.

4/4/2004 Ben Lehman: Religion!
Hi. This is the new religion thread. Post here. I am curious as to people's religious beliefs. I ask this because I am in a muddle about my own beliefs…
In Forge Birthday Forum
Participants: Ben Lehman, Shreyas Sampat, Christopher Kubasik, Eero Tuovinen, ethan_greer, taalyn, clehrich, Sean, Simon W, C. Edwards, Lxndr, coxcomb, Jack Spencer Jr, J B Bell, joshua neff, Jonathan Walton, Valamir, RaconteurX, greyorm, talysman, cruciel, Ben Terry, Brian Leybourne, contracycle, lumpley, quozl, Christopher Weeks, Rich Forest, BPetroff93, Anonymous, Green, Matt Wilson, Scourge108, Yasha, DannyK, Jack Aidley, Marhault, orbsmatt, Rich Stokes, Muggins.

4/7/2004 Ben Lehman: Status of Alyria
Hey... So everything I've heard about this system makes it sound perfect for a game that I want to run in the Fall, but I don't know if the game…
In Dark Omen Games
Participants: Ben Lehman, GreatWolf, M. J. Young, Rich Stokes, Valamir, arxhon, Mike Holmes.

4/7/2004 Ben Lehman: Grand Forge Cross-Country Road Trip!
Hi all-- Since I'm not a Company (yet) I don't know if this would belong in the Conventions forum, but it's definitely "on-topic" for this forum. So, I'm pondering the…
In Forge Birthday Forum
Participants: Ben Lehman, Wolfen, lumpley.

4/10/2004 Ben Lehman: GenCon Booth Monkey Questions
Hi. The possibility of me being at GenCon this year is increasing daily, so I thought I would ask some questions about the difference between Forge Booth Monkey attendance and…
In Conventions
Participants: Ben Lehman, Matt Wilson, Lxndr, Tav_Behemoth, daMoose_Neo, Ron Edwards, Dav, Jürgen Mayer, Nev the Deranged.

4/11/2004 Ben Lehman: Sorcerer Comic
Apologies to those that may have already seen this: http://www.angryflower.com/master.gif
In Adept Press
Participants: Ben Lehman, sirogit, tetsujin28.

4/11/2004 Ben Lehman: On Dragons and Evil
"Fairy Tales do not tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed." --GK Chesterton This is a topic…
In Dark Omen Games
Participants: Ben Lehman, GreatWolf, Trevis Martin.

4/19/2004 Ben Lehman: System Typing
I have an idea. Now, as I begin to lay this idea out, I think people are going to instantly relate it to another set of three categories which have…
In RPG Theory
Participants: Ben Lehman, Eero Tuovinen, BPetroff93, lumpley, John Kim, cruciel, FredGarber, M. J. Young, Emily Care.

4/19/2004 Ben Lehman: Gamism and Narrativism
I have been thinking, recently, apropos to lumpley's Arranging the Pieces of the Game as to what really defines Narrativism and Gamism, at a base. I think that there…
In GNS Model Discussion
Participants: Ben Lehman, Eero Tuovinen, Rob Carriere, greyorm, Doyce, Ron Edwards, beingfrank, M. J. Young, pete_darby, Valamir, contracycle, Walt Freitag, Emily Care, Ian Charvill, cruciel, DannyK.

4/21/2004 Ben Lehman: Polaris: Trait Bidding
Yet another "Iron Game Chef" follow-up thread. I'm almost reluctant to post this, because I don't want to point out flaws in my game before the judging, but I really…
In Indie Game Design
Participants: Ben Lehman, Eero Tuovinen.

4/26/2004 Ben Lehman: Dice Selection
So I have this problem with the game as it is written. For a while, I've been wringing my hands over whether to post it or not, because it's a…
In lumpley games
Participants: Ben Lehman, lumpley, bluegargantua, Emily Care, ScottM.

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