The Icon Riffs series offers inspiration for adventure design and improvisation at the table. The ideas presented aren’t numbered, because numbered lists imply a certain consistency between results. These lists are evocative rather than consistent. They’re also not thorough. This isn’t an attempt to list all the things that could be associated with the icons. There are huge numbers […]
Author Archives: Rob Heinsoo
When many people give you the same feedback about your game for years, it’s got to have some truth in it. Today’s probable truth: “The combination of the wizard’s Evocation talent and the force salvo spell is broken.” Some GMs even report that the combo skews their thinking as they set up battles, since they […]
Jonathan and I usually agree on the mechanics of 13th Age, but our memories don’t always agree when it comes to how key mechanics were created.* The escalation die is a prime example. I remember using the escalation die in a bizarro 4e game, fighting minions of Torog, back before we started work on 13th Age. […]
The Icon Riffs series offers inspiration for adventure design and improvisation at the table. The ideas presented aren’t numbered, because numbered lists imply a certain consistency between results. These lists are evocative rather than consistent. They’re also not thorough. This isn’t an attempt to list all the things that could be associated with the icons. There are huge numbers […]
An interviewer once asked us, “If someone has never played a tabletop RPG, why would 13th Age be a good game for them to try?” Well, that interview never ran, so we’re going to share our answers here. We designed 13th Age for experienced GMs, but it can be a great entry point into the hobby for new […]
Despite our chatty and occasionally informative sidebars, we don’t get around to explaining all our design decisions in 13th Age. Today we’ll take a look at a 13 True Ways design choice that could use a bit of explanation. Multiclass penalties The multiclass system in chapter 2 of 13 True Ways is a tool whose […]
by Rob Heinsoo Here are answers to the trivia questions from a few days ago, along with bonus stories and links. A. What monster in the core 13th Age rulebook became one of the player characters in my home campaign? The demon-touched human ranger on page 235 is one of just two human antagonists in […]
By Rob Heinsoo Welcome to the first-ever 13th Age Trivia & Miscellany 7-Question Non-Contest Experience. If you’re into trivia contests, oh happy day, hooray. Make your answers to one more questions as comments below and we’ll give a shout out later to the first person who correctly answered each specific question. If puzzling over obscure […]
My Playtest Feedback Process by Rob Heinsoo I’m just about to start going through playtest feedback for 13th Age in Glorantha. I thought readers of this blog might be interested in how I process playtest feedback for 13th Age books. Sometimes I read playtest feedback right away. But usually I wait and read as much […]
This newly arrived 13th Age zombie has two inspirations. First, I’ve been reading Jason Sholtis’ compilation of The Dungeon Dozen: Random-Tables for Fantasy RPGs. “Reading” may be the wrong word, but I’ve definitely been picking it up and allowing photons from its pages to slam into my eyeballs. Second, I like the way one of […]