Progressions
It’s been a while since I’ve made a blog post, but I feel it’s time. Please bear with this long post because I have a lot to say :)! I FINALLY got the chance to run the Shards RPG the other day with a group of 5 who handily completed the Sweeney Toddler chapter.
Hats off to very fine role playing from everybody ESPECIALLY to the player playing Muffett (who happened to be the most inexperienced role-player at the table). She took Muffett’s personality and made it her own: believable, authentic, and unpredictable. Her actions forced hearty role-playing, and the interactions between her and Dorothy forced very interesting interactions between ALL players. The depth of character development this session was astounding. Characters involved were Cinderella, Jack, Dorothy, Alice, and Miss Muffett.
The more time I invest in this system, the more I see its appeal and flaws. The most basic parts of the system are done, but all the powers I’ve created have been on the fly, no concrete system to the powers’ damage and effects. Making a customizable power system is by far the most challenging creative aspect I’ve ever encountered in my 23 years of being a Game Master.
I still don’t even know if I’m up to the arduous task of attempting to seek funding and publishing a system like this. Dungeons and Dragons 5th edition is on the horizon, I’m curious to see how they incoroporate the desires of the current player base with the need to gain new consumers.
But the role-playing isn’t the only thing that’s coming along in our lives. Jade and I sat down and had a long discussion about Shards and its current progression. There are many stories that have occurred so far. Some of them are far too adult to ever post as one of our standard webcomic stories. In addition, we want you guys to meet some of the more constant characters in our universe. Two of which will be showing up in the next chapter. You’ve met all of our heroes. We want to introduce you to our antagonists and foils. Which means skipping many stories and glossing over what happened very briefly in a strip or two.
Jade and I have considered making a full comic book for sale of some of the stories that we are skipping over. We’ll keep you guys posted on it :).
I have to agree, the player of Miss Muffett was the star of the evening. I had a blast, even though I was a bit run down. I was playing Alice, for anyone interested. I don’t know how much Jade and TB want to keep things under wraps so any questions you may have I’ll have to run by them. I think I can say without any impunity that if even some of the quotes and role playing in our session grace the pages of the published comic you are all in for a treat.
Of course, none of it would be possible without the creative minds of Jade and TB. Without their twist on these stories and dedication to the RPG game itself, none of our efforts would even be possible. So thanks to both of them for such a wonderful and creative story and system.
TB and I have been working on Alice behind the scenes, making tweaks to her powers, designing new powers, etc. The system itself is really in constant alpha testing so these sessions are full of constant tweaks. As a group, we all had creative uses and ideas of all the skills, powers and themes which in some cases caused them to change mid session. I think the entire group deserves huge credit for latching onto their characters and not only developing the personalities but helping to determine what and what does not work within the system itself.
Now I want to get in the game a lot more than before. But I’m down here in Tassie… Unless you guys can handle a remote player, at which point, let’s start discussing timezones.
I may consider hosting a remote session in the future, but not at this time. If I were to host a virtual session it would be to promo the site, and a system which I’m about ready to go commercial with
We may also do a contest to determine remote players.
I also do host a game or two during conventions we attend. We’ll make sure everyone is notified if we’re going to attend any conventions :).
The problem is that it’s safe to say you’ll not come to a convention in Tassie anytime soon, and I doubt you’ll be down in Australia at all, least of all a time when I can get up to the mainland to meet you.
So, I shall wait for that time when I can sit at the virtual table with you.
Ditto for the Netherlands. ;p I’d love to be able to join y’all online, given the chance. (Maybe without blowing up four characters this time…)
I will not set foot in Australia, Your bugs and spiders are far too large for my tastes :).