In Hillfolk the GM acts as the custodian of the overall narrative. You mostly do this when calling your own scenes. You use these to heighten tensions, add new fresh developments, and picking up previous ones that got dropped along the way. Less evidently, you can also intervene during player scenes. This requires utmost subtlety. […]
Tag Archives: robin d laws
When Mutant City Blues came out, examples of super powered police procedural TV shows were hard to come by. Back then we had to imagine a hybrid of those two genres. With examples now popping up on network and streaming TV, you kids today have it easy! “The Flash” comes closest to the structure envisioned […]
As extensively, nay giddily, described in a recent episode of Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff, the two of us received a sneak peek at the books on display in the Royal College of Physicians’ current John Dee exhibition. Among the treasures we examined was Dee’s copy of Trithemius’ Polygraphie. Its pages include several volvelles, […]
A Column on Roleplaying by Robin D. Laws Excerpt from an Ordo Veritatis threat analysis report (draft version) Author Codename: Coastpoint In this department we think often of ODEs (Outer Dark Entities) but too little of a parallel phenomenon, one I will, for lack of a better term, call the Outer Dark Intersection. For the […]
In space, the darkest day of the year is every day. Nonetheless, five of the Combine’s seven major species evolved naturally on home planets before reaching for the stars, and to various degrees remember rituals and holidays that marked the turning point between encroaching and receding night. Before the war, human secularism confined Christmas celebrations […]
Thank you as always for gathering on short notice. I trust you found your travel arrangements satisfactory. Two nights ago local police officers patrolling the city’s entertainment district found a corpse in an alleyway. Due to its condition our contacts within the force referred the case to us. The body is that of an as […]
Ken’s upcoming Fall of Delta Green will get Trail of Cthulhu as far into the modern era as it’s likely to go for a while. In the meantime, here’s a quick and dirty ability list with which GUMSHOE investigators can learn too much about the Mythos in 2015 and beyond. With its forensic procedural […]
A Fear Itself Scenario Premise Start by designing high school age characters. Confine the Worst Thing You Ever Did to the sorts of transgressions ordinary teenagers might get up to. You all hang out together, regarding yourselves as semi-outsiders. You aren’t bullied, nor are you bullies. But neither are you the insider kids. A random […]
Frustrated in your hunt for Quandos Vorn, the arch-criminal of the Gaean Reach upon whom you have sworn vengeance dire? Rather than seek him directly, you and the rest of your rag-tag band of righteous grudge holders may find it fruitful to follow the trail of an item he has stolen. Yes, perhaps in some […]
Your freelance law enforcement crew may have formed and then found a ship with which to ply the justice trade out in the Bleed. Or perhaps you joined an existing laser gang that already had a ship. Whether or not you had a say in the class of ship you crew on, it has an […]