Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Nate

Luna P. @satelitesnaturales.bsky.social · Mar 4

Hey gamers, Luna here. I'm a graphic designer for ttrpgs, you can hire me to make your zines cooler, or to kill your enemies with my mind. Unless they deal poison damage, then I'm out. Anyways, you want this. Yes?

Table of contents for the game OMEN. Grey and red stripes decorate the page with the titles for each section.

A 3D render of a spread from wolves at the lake. There's a zine and 2 red die on dark wooden planks.

A spread from a feast for a sphinx. It depicts a centipede person holding an obsidian spearhead, along with the descriptions of said weapon and the rooms 7 and 8. The colors red and gold adorn the white page.

A spread from the goblin mail extras zine. Showing two characters, a mail goblin and a robot made out of mail. The art is black and white and features halftone pictures of stamps.

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Reposted by Nate

Spice8Rack (Marxist) @spice8rack.bsky.social · 2d

People using Margaret Thatcher' 100th birthday to celebrate her death is so disappointing to me. You can celebrate her death EVERY day of the year, people!

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · 5d

Aes really can rap about anything. His track about invasive aquarium snails is peak.

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Reposted by Nate

Josh Fox 🔜 Ex Tenebris coming to Kickstarter @armadajosh.bsky.social · 7d

By the way, my real hot take is, die choice doesn't really matter. It's a tiny, unimportant part of game design that gets massively overfocused on. Calling a game "2d6 based" or whatever is like saying a car is "red paint job based".

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Reposted by Nate

Binary @binarystar.games · 9d

Papercult is still up and running and thriving, which is something I *should* periodically remind people when the owner of this site isn't crashing out, but especially when they are: papercult.club

papercult.club

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Reposted by Nate

Erika Chappell 🏳️‍⚧️ Stop Asking For STLs @opensketchbook.bsky.social · 15d

I Was Reborn Into Another Randomly Generated World?

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · 26d

One of the few "I will automatically buy this game if you said it was good" voices on youtube.

dragonkid11 @11dragonkid11.bsky.social · 26d

You know, I don't really have the complete understanding how people look at me, so I'm shooting the arrow here. Like me, hate me, let's see it.

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Reposted by Nate

Oliver @dubiousdevil.bsky.social · 27d

*fires off a single fireball towards you that slowly tracks you*
*fires off a single fireball towards you that slowly tracks you*
*fires off a single fireball towards you that slowly tracks you*
*fires off a single fireball towards you that slowly tracks you*

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · 27d

Entirely genuine I believe. It might be the perfect post.

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · 27d

This reminded me of an all time classic

A tweet from Brad Anderson that reads "I get the point you're trying to make, but I have yet to meet a hetero woman who enthusiastically participates in sex."

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Sep 11

I've been planning to start a blog with a piece on character death in play and design, I feel like this is a sign.

Reposted by Nate

lumpley @lumpley.bsky.social · Sep 11

I'm just having a small moment of contentment for typing "was" instead of "is" into this google search.

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Reposted by Nate

Radmad @radmad.bsky.social · Sep 8

We are 27% funded! Let's keep that momentum going!

Radmad @radmad.bsky.social · Sep 1

And it's live!

A new world struggles to be born
Now is the time of beasts

Join me and @cyberneticcoven.bsky.social for the mythic America bounty hunting TTRPG, All the World's Prey!

Jump on the KS below to see all the cool stuff!
www.kickstarter.com/projects/all...

All the World's Prey

An 1800s bounty hunting tabletop roleplaying game in mythic America

www.kickstarter.com

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Reposted by Nate

🥖Kekeflipnote🥖 @kekeflipnote.bsky.social · Apr 2

REAL !

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Sep 3

lol, lmao even

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Sep 1

Dozens of us

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Sep 1

oh I think you might have me mixed up with grinning rat, I don't have an active blog atm.
Turns out there are at least two Nates in ttrpg design circles who associate with rats.

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Sep 1

Dude looks fucking *hollow* and dear god do I hope he feels even worse.

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Reposted by Nate

Aaron Voigt @aavoigt.bsky.social · Aug 29

If you're looking for a lunch break video, or something to ease you into the long weekend, consider watching my setting analysis of the Wildsea! I talk about trade a normal amount i promise

Aaron Voigt @aavoigt.bsky.social · Aug 27

My latest video is a setting analysis of @felixisaacs.bsky.social's "The Wildsea!" I borrow inspiration from the work of scholar Stefan Ekman, and use his critical worldbuilding ideas to imagine how the world's culture is impacted by key setting touchstones.

How the Wildsea Produces Culture [TTRPG Setting Analysis]

YouTube video by A.A. Voigt

youtu.be

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Aug 28

Congrats, you get it

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Reposted by Nate

Aaron Voigt @aavoigt.bsky.social · Aug 27

Evening bump for my new video!

Aaron Voigt @aavoigt.bsky.social · Aug 27

My latest video is a setting analysis of @felixisaacs.bsky.social's "The Wildsea!" I borrow inspiration from the work of scholar Stefan Ekman, and use his critical worldbuilding ideas to imagine how the world's culture is impacted by key setting touchstones.

How the Wildsea Produces Culture [TTRPG Setting Analysis]

YouTube video by A.A. Voigt

youtu.be

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Reposted by Nate

Grant Howitt @gshowitt.bsky.social · Aug 26

Writing a GM section is hard.

So instead I wrote down every role I could imagine that a GM might play and instructed the reader to kind of figure it out themselves as they go

WHAT DOES BEING A GAMESMASTER INVOLVE?
As Gamesmaster, you’ll have a lot of different roles to play. Here are some of them in no particular order; you’ll adopt all, some, more, or none of these during every single session.

You don’t have to be all of these things all at once, nor do you have to do all of them yourself - when you’re starting out, as long as players are getting the chance to roll dice and mess around they’ll probably still have fun. As you play more, you’ll find which ones you enjoy and which ones you don’t, and you’ll find your style.

FUN ADMINISTRATOR
If it wasn’t for you, this game would never happen. You arranged a time and date. You reserved the back room in the pub to play. You helped everyone make their characters. You’re the first person they talk to if they can’t make it to a game, and you’re the final judge as to whether a session goes ahead as planned or must be rescheduled. You’re taking responsibility for all the background details that let the foreground details - the game - work.

PETTY GOD
This is your world. We just described it in loose terms - it’s coming out of your mouth, and you’re making all the decisions. You can adjust numerical values up and down as you wish. You can wipe cities, countries, concepts off the map entirely if you don’t like them. You alone determine whether things are possible or impossible, and you can dictate how dangerous a given task is with ease. Nothing happens unless you want it to. The player characters are scrubbing about in this world of yours, and you graciously let them do so, because they’re having fun. And so are you; you call the shots, you set the boundaries, you show them the fantastic world you’ve dreamed into being.

ORACLE
You are the sole focus of interaction that the players have with the game. In one direction, you are the source of all information about the fiction at the table: so if they want to know what colour a non-player character’s eyes are, they have to ask you and you’re beholden to tell them, or tell them how their characters could find out. In the other direction, you are the fuzzy authority that stands between every player and us, the designers of the game, and therefore the interpreter of the rules. All fictional and mechanical action goes through you.

A CAST OF THOUSANDS
You are everyone else in the world that isn’t a player character. You invent and then adopt their mannerisms, you spin together obvious motivations and secret desires, and you flip between your charges with ease. Sure: many of their voices might sound …

TOUR GUIDE
We’ve written a guidebook for a world that doesn’t exist, and you’re the tour guide who’s leading slack-jawed holidaymakers around that world. You know everything there is to know about the game world - and if you don’t know, you can make it up, and that’s just as good. You’re relentlessly enthusiastic, you give evocative descriptions, and you clue the players into what’s interesting or important - and you know all the best places to take them, too, so they’ll experience the world as best they can.

WET COMPUTER
At the core of every roleplaying game is a set of rules that power the experience, and you are the fallible, non-silicate computer on which these rules run. You know the rules, you enforce them (or ignore them, as you see fit), and you remind players of how best to interact with them. Players might use some bits themselves - rolling to hit, for example, or keeping track of their character’s health - but you’re the ultimate authority on what rule to use when.

CON ARTIST
Players? Bunch of feckless rubes. Look at them, wide-eyed and open-mouthed: they think this is a living, breathing world. They think that you’ve got this all written down, like some kind of Tolkien; they couldn’t be more wrong. You’re just making it up on the fly. There’s nothing behind the curtain, no master plan, no wheels within wheels: just you, regurgitating some half-remembered details about Bloodborne and talking about bones breaking a lot because that makes them wince. They’ll buy anything you sell ‘em.

WORKSHOP LEADER
You don’t have all the answers, but you know where to find them: inside the players’ heads. You ask them questions like “Who are we meeting here?” “What’s the most dangerous thing that awaits you on your journey?” “Which one of you does this guy hate the most?” and then you listen to the answers and incorporate them into the story. You love it - it saves work, saves time, and means that the players are more involved and engaged than ever. Involved and enga…

DRUMMER
The drummer sets the pace. In a band, they dictate the song’s tempo. In a regiment, they dictate the marching speed. (In a marching band they do both, presumably.) You’re in charge of saying when things begin and end, how long a scene takes to play out, how long a non-player character waffles on about their problems, how descriptive an average description is, and so on. You can cut away from situations and cut back later, you can put the pressure on players to make a decision, or you can leave them to chat to one another unobstructed as the hours roll by.

ABSOLUTE BASTARD
You’re going to kill them. You’ve trapped them in your lair. They dared to step up and try to defeat your monsters, overthrow your villains, and now they’re on the back foot. Smash them to fucking bits. Throw ‘em through a window, rip off arms and legs, take grim pleasure when their luck turns against them. No-one gets anywhere by being nice all the time - and the players don’t want you to be nice all the time. They want their characters to get beaten up, humiliated, murdered, hung-drawn-and-quartered. You know that this is a masochistic endeavour and you are happy to indulge them.

TORTURED ARTIST
You always wanted to be creative, and this is your outlet. You’ve spun a world of torment and tragedy (or light-hearted slapstick, depending on the game) for your players to explore - or crafted a complex story within someone else’s, full of betrayals and comeuppances and juicy details. You’ve taken the time to make something clever and you can’t wait for your friends to admire it; what matters most is getting the artistic intent of your world across to the players so they can react appropriately.

OBSESSIVE FAN
Oh my god. You love the player characters so much. Like your favourite character in your favourite TV show, you’re fascinated to see what they’ll do next - and you can probably take a good guess at what it’ll be, because you know them so well. You get a bit sad when bad things happen to…

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Aug 26

Honestly I'm enjoying the fiddliness of going full monster hunter with it. A while back we considered something like that with a tags system on it, but I love the bespoke approach despite its clear pitfalls.
We wanna give the table all the cool gear, without relying on the GM doing the work for us

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Aug 26

Turns out making the monster hunter style "every bit of gear is bespoke and made from very specific materials" work in a ttrpg in a way that doesn't completely suck is like, extremely fiddly.

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Nate @bigratgames.bsky.social · Aug 23

Game design tip: just go for a walk

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