A column about roleplaying By Robin D. Laws After a four decade restoration project, a book shrine found in a lake has gone on display at the National Museum of Ireland. Only seven others of its kind survive. Known as cumdachs, these elaborately decorated cases of metal-shod wood were fashioned to contain precious devotional […]
Tag Archives: robin d laws
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Jun
Jun
A column about roleplaying By Robin D. Laws When asked what one can do to be a better player, the first thing I always say is: the mere fact that you’re concerned about this suggests that you’re probably already most of the way there. The second thing I say is: see where the ball is, […]
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Jun
Jun
In Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff 603 we riffed a series of plot hooks arising from the career of experimental filmmaker and Vodou researcher Maya Deren. But maybe that left you unsatisfied, wanting a Yellow King: This is Normal Now scenario hook that drew in all of experimental cinema. You absolutely requested that, so […]
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May
May
A column on roleplaying by Robin D. Laws GUMSHOE players sometimes clutch when they realize that one of them has to go talk to someone. Break through that moment of indecision by following these simple steps. Interpersonal abilities exist to help make this decision. Start by asking yourself what you know about this person, and […]
Page Turners, the game of dramatic interaction for one player and one game moderator, allows you to explore any story that revolves around interpersonal conflict. Some scenarios supplied in the book mix familiar genre tropes with the game’s character-driven storytelling structure. Sarah Saltiel’s “Addison’s Shadow,” brings the contemporary fantastical imagery of the weird tale into […]
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May
May
Playtest reports for The Yellow King Roleplaying Game gave me one consistent message: This game is way too deadly! Accordingly, I made it less so, lowering Difficulty Numbers for tests to avoid Shocks and Injuries. I added the more forgiving Occult Adventure mode, where it takes 4 Shock or 4 Injury cards to take a […]
To celebrate the Shadowlands Spanish-language release of the Worldbreaker campaign book for The Esoterrorists, Álvaro Loman interviews Robin on all things GUMSHOE. If we didn’t know better we’d think that Álvaro kind of wants the Ordo Veritatis to be bad sometimes. But how could we think such a thing? The Esoterrorists are occult terrorists intent […]
Page Turners, the game of dramatic interaction for one player and one game moderator, provides rules for play in any genre that revolves around interpersonal conflict. It includes eleven fully fleshed scenarios ranging from screwball comedy to doomed vampire romance, from a behind-the-music rock ‘n’ roll saga to the emotional journeys of the last […]
Although the rules don’t call for it, some GUMSHOE groups add a narrative wrinkle to the spending of pool points from general abilities. They call on players to justify why they’re spending the number of points they’ve chosen to add to their die rolls. “I really want to get over this fence so I’m going […]
We are beyond thrilled to announce that, after two decades of brilliant collaboration, Robin D. Laws has officially stepped into the role of Creative Director at Pelgrane Press. For more than 20 years, Robin has been a driving creative force behind so many of our most significant and innovative projects. He designed Pelgrane’s very first […]