John WS Marvin 3/8/18 John WS Marvin 3/8/18

Women in Gaming

It's International Women's Day, and here at Dread Unicorn Games we'd like to salute all women gamers. We believe that the great strides made in the past by the hobby to welcome and include girls and women will look like baby steps to our future selves. This is a hobby for anyone with an interest and an imagination.

In Appreciation of Our Women Creators

Alicia Severson, art (The Sun Below: City on the Edge, The Sun Below: Sleeping Lady)
Alison Wells, editing (The Sun Below: City on the Edge, The Sun Below: Sleeping Lady, The Sun Below: That's How the Light Gets In, Gods and Icons, Gods and Icons Player's Companion, Gods and Icons Upgrade Pack, The Gods Have Spoken, Tower in the Mist, The Gray World)
Alysha Lach, art (The Sun Below: City on the Edge, The Sun Below: Sleeping Lady, The Sun Below: That's How the Light Gets In, Gods and Icons, Gods and Icons Player's Companion, Gods and Icons Upgrade Pack, The Gods Have Spoken, The Gray World)
Britanny Zendegas, art (The Sun Below: City on the Edge, The Sun Below: Sleeping Lady)
Chole Wenz, art (The Gray World)
Megan Tolentino, writing (The Sun Below: That's How the Light Gets In)
Nikole McDonald-Jones, art (Gods and Icons, Gods and Icons Player's Companion, Gods and Icons Upgrade Pack, The Gods Have Spoken, The Overworld and Beyond)
Sparrow Buerer, art & cartography (The Sun Below: Sleeping Lady, Gods and Icons)
Vanessa Rose Phin (nonbinary), writing (Gods and Icons, Gods and Icons Player's Companion, The Gods Have Spoken)

John WS Marvin 7/23/15 John WS Marvin 7/23/15

Horror on the Cypher System Express

I've always enjoyed a great eldritch horror game: Call of Cthulhu or more recently, Trail of Cthulhu. And I really enjoy the Cypher System, the core rules used in Numenera and The Strange. Now, with the publication of the Cypher System Rulebook, I can mix my shuggoths and my GM Intrusions. So, how does horror work in the Cypher System? First, I should explain a little about how the Cypher System Rulebook works. It's a menu of rules a GM (and players) can chose from to create their own game. Besides horror, there are rules for science fiction, fantasy, modern, and superheros. Within each genre, you get more choices. Lots of optional rules to tailor the game to just the right kind of horror.

The rulebook has a big bestiary of creatures to choose from and the horror section lists the ones that best fit a horror campaign, including Deep Ones and Mi-Go. It also includes 3 horror artifacts, so if you want more, you're going to have to make some yourself.

Art by Doug Scott

The horror rules are all optional rules. Madness will be familiar to Cthulhu players. Cypher System madness grew out of the madness rules found in In Strange Aeons: Lovecraftian Numenera. In this case madness puts a hurt on your Intellect pool and can even change your descriptor. I do something similar in The Sun Below: Sleeping Lady, which has a seriously eldrtich horror vibe.

Shock is another optional rule, more for short term effects like losing control of your character and running away or sitting down to sob rather than fight. Trail of Cthulhu players will find it very similar to Stability losses. Different mechanics, but going for the same effect.

Combine both Madness and Shock if you want a game like Trail of Cthulhu, or just Madness if you want a Call of Cthulhuish experience.

I've saved the most interesting for last. Horror Mode. Horror mode is a great way to ramp up tension, as the range for a GM Intrusion (the dice fail kind, not the 2xp kind) goes up to a 1-2 on a d20 roll. Then 1-3. And so on. You can get to 1-10 fairly quickly. Each GM Intrusion brings new horror AND widens the GM Intrusion range by one.

After the horror mode is over, you reset the GM Intrusion range to 1. Until the next time...

Which has me thinking of a Cypher Cthulhu adventure. I'm sure my players would love it!

John WS Marvin 4/21/15 John WS Marvin 4/21/15

Fun in Phandalin

I'm still in boxes from my recent home move, but took the time to play in a roll20 5E game. Like pretty much every rpg game I've played, we had the most fun roleplaying. The combat had tactical interest, but the banter and imagination of the roleplay segments were great. I'm the idiot on the right.

It's one thing to play a D&D Cleric. It's another to have 2 heal spells and then have to rest for 8 hours. First level is a bit too old school for me.

If you want to see the unedited* recordings from Starwalker Studio, go here: https://www.youtube.com/user/StarwalkerStudios. It's D&D Lost Mine of Phandelver. Part I starts at 13:15.

If watching someone else play doesn't do it for you, I understand. It's way more fun to play than watch. For those who like to watch, enjoy!

*Not picking on Starwalker Studios here, just setting expectations. Almost all Actual Play recordings are unedited. Editing is a ton of work, and no one is paying for these.