gamesandrants

Kia Ora friends

Today's Topic: Space!

It's my holidays right now, which means this is the time for me to do any work on creative things for myself, without having to worry about students and lesson planning. I've been thinking a lot about space.
Firstly, I'm writing my LARP, S.W.I.P.E., for Phoenix 2017. It's about a group of energy based aliens who have possessed some humans and are readying for the invasion. However, it's been a while with no contact and... maybe they're having second thoughts. This game has been really challenging to write as the human sides and the alien sides of these beings are both involved. It's pretty weird (as you will have come to expect from my games).
I also was recently gifted a copy of the new "Far Beyond Humanity" supplement for Uncharted Worlds. Uncharted Worlds is the PbtA equivalent of Traveller. I had been looking for a simple sci-fi game (prefereably PbtA) for aaages and this was finally it! In its basic form, it can tell stories like Firefly, The Expanse and Battlestar Galactica (somewhat realistic and mainly about humans). I am excited that this supplement opens things up to include things you might like from Star Trek, Star Wars, Mass Effect and more. I am now pretty excited to attempt a campaign. Maybe I even have time for one!

What I'm playing

I've been playing more board games lately, which has been nice. To continue the space theme, Tiny Epic Galaxies with the new "Beyond the Black" expansion has hit the table a few times. I've also played quite a lot of Mystic Vale, which I really enjoy for its unique mechanic.
I played in a one-off guest role as part of a D&D campaign with some people I didn't know, which was rather fun. When I arrived, the GM presented me with a list of meta-rules about how he wants everyone to behave and the kind of stories he wanted to tell. I found this super useful! I immediately felt put at ease about playing with people I didn't know and knew what the expectations were. I will probably talk more about pre-game communication between GM and players in another entry because I think it's very important and I know I haven't always used this as well as I could in the past.
I have also now run two sessions of the game I am going to present to you in the next segment!

Here's a thing

There's a pretty good chance that you have come across the wonderful microsystem called Roll for Shoes. I have recently put together a scenario using the system to tell the story of a group of alien beings readying Earth for invasion. The premise of the game is similar to that of my LARP, S.W.I.P.E. but much lighter and sillier (no spoilers either). Both sessions I have run involved a lot of laughter and fun.

Roll for Invasion

Ciarán

Uncharted Worlds logo