Do You Play Multiple RPGs at Your Home Table?

The last couple of years I've made the major shift of being predominately a GM to predominately a player. I still GM, but usually when our group's GM needs a break, which is usually during the "Retail Hell" period of the year.

In talking with other GMs and gamers I'm finding that our general situation is the same. Most group basically have one "main" GM and maybe some fill-ins when that GM is either burned out or just too busy to take up the shield.

I think the average group has their main "go-to" RPG and that's usually what they play. When another GM picks up the shield then they might try a different RPG...might. From what I've gathered it is about 50/50 of thing being just a different campaign of the same RPG (like we do) or a brief switch to something else.

It is far from secret that my favorite game is the current edition of HackMaster. I've got a small roster of RPGs I need to run/play for review purposes and I'm trying to get my group to do some one-offs as a change of pace and to help me through this backlog since my con season is over until next year (I think....)

I was wondering just how many gaming groups take the time to "change things up" just for the experience. Honestly if it were for wanting/needing to review some other RPGs I doubt I'd stray too far from my main game, definitely not at my home table.

Frugal GM Review: Outpost Owlbear (One Page Zine)

I wanted to get this review up in time yesterday, but life got in the way......you guys know what I mean....life...that thing that happens when we aren't gaming....

Tony T won that paper mini contest I had, which meant he also got my address. While this is something that anybody can easily find with little effort, most folks don't want (or need) this info. Tony T decided to send me all three issues of his One Page Zine Outpost Owlbear.

I'll have to admit that I was kind of excited to get a piece of "real" mail. Outside of holiday cards I'm used to junk mail and bills. I can't remember the last time I had real mail.

Reading the Outpost Owlbear issues I was a bit all over the place as to how I felt about it, and I'm assuming that might be some of those outside "life" issues creeping in. My 1st thoughts, outside of the elation of "real mail" was that this One Page Zine was a quick & crude version of what I was trying to accomplish with my Tweak & Toss adventure "things". Of course this line of thought really isn't fair to the Zine.....

I read through the issues and let them stew for a bit.....

...and I definitely came around. Each issue is a quick two-page adventure setup for new/low-level PCs. I can see easily stepping things up, without difficulty, for mid-level PCs. They are good reads and even with the hand-written format, I think for a buck there is actually a lot of production value here.

Initially I thought that maybe these issues were printed out on custom paper stock, as if Tony had custom paper made and then printed the issues onto that stock. After a closer inspection I'm thinking he printed a letterhead out on a color printer, wrote the issue, and then scanned it in to a PDF and printed it out on colored paper. Either way he printed in color (basically just blues and black).

$1 for two pages color printing & mailed out....I don't think Tony T is likely to be breaking even.

The Outpost Owlbear blog is a little light on the details....like we don't know what the intended frequency is, but the fact there is something for this new endeavor I take as a good sign. While I'm giving Outpost Owlbear 4 stars, this is one of those few items I'd rather encourage folks to try out for themselves. At only $1 you can get some real mail and make your own judgement.

Me? I'm looking to see where this thing goes. It makes me want to look at more One Page Zines......

My Reaction to the Recent WotC News

Man, this news I just don't get.

Wizards of the Coast is choosing to shut down what they consider to be a "former foundation" of their online community....their forums.

On October 29th, 2015 at 10:00 AM PT they are pulling the plug on their forums. I think this is a big mistake. Yes, I get that a lot of the conversation about games is migrating to other social media, but you know what? When you go to places like Facebook, your company information is just a small sliver of the crap-ton of "stuff" being pushed in front of your fan base. So much "stuff" is out there that the owners of those social media sites have to use algorithms to determine how much of what to show.

In other words, you are choosing to bury your content in a pile of other "CLICK ME" content and then handing the reigns over to someone else to dictate what your fans/customers see.

Now I think it would be stupid to not have a social media presence, but they should augment, not replace, your own information/marketing efforts. Company game forums have long been the absolute best place for fans to get information about your products and connect with like-minded individuals. On company forums you get to determine the layout of your sub-forums and you get to decide what is important to get in front of your customers.

Forums can be used to help create a sense of community in a manner that I just don't see from social media. I just don't see this announcement as good news....

Some New Maps in Progress, Could Use Some Input

I am working on some special cavernous Tweak & Toss adventures specifically for publication and I thought I'd solicit some advice from my regular readers.

The publication is B&W and I have the rough dimensions for the art and what I'm trying to do is make everything as publication-ready as possible. This is not just they'll be more likely to use the work, but also because I want more practice trying to work within specific confines. When I'm doing stuff for Frugal GM publication on DTRPG, or for Patreon my only constraints is what my computer can handle.

Obviously I'm working in larger sizes & dpi, but I thought I'd throw up some examples here for input. I already have my preferences, which I'll state at the end, but here are some of the decisions I'm trying to run with. I'm going to put the large pictures after the break so it won't slow things down for folks who don't want to look and give input:

(Another) Free GM Resource: Death by Nexus (DCC 0 Lvl Funnel)

Since I already have something picked out for next week's Free GM Resource I really didn't want to wait yet another week to highlight this new free Dungeon Crawl Classics character funnel.

Death by Nexus sounds interesting....I've downloaded it, but aside from an extremely quick flip-through I haven't looked at it in the off chance I get to play in it someday.

The idea is intriguing though, and reminds me about the one 0 Lvl DCC Character Funnel I played in at Origins. If this adventure is half as fun as that one it is a winner!

I won't provide a direct download link, but here is the page where you can find it.

Free GM Resource: CX1 Extra (Gnomes) from New Big Dragon Games

Quick question.....have you checked out the "+12 Links of Helpfulness"? Now I'm not saying I'm always on the ball with the ancillary pages here on the Frugal GM blog, but smack-dab in the middle of the (probably too few) "worthwhile blogs" I have listed is Save vs. Dragon, the online presence of Richard J. LeBlanc, Jr.

Well, he does have a "real website" for his publishing, but I get more mileage out of his blog myself.

The thing is if you had been on top of the links, or bothered to "subscribe" to the blog, then you'd know that he's been working on some cool stuff. I like to see what he's got going on, but tend to wait until everything is fully cooked and assembled before really digging in.

This weekend Richard cooked off another supplement that is good to go.....a BX Accessory for Gnomes simply labeled CX1 Extra Gnomes. Now I'm not a big fan of Gnomes myself, but I did like what he's done with them and next time I run an appropriate game I'm allowing my players to use this race & sub-races.

Great job...can't wait for the full CX1! Now we only need more cowbell, er d30....but probably wise not to mix the product lines too much....

FGM035: The Horrors of Halfing Hollow is now Available!

Well, I finally got the new Tweak & Toss up. The problem from this morning wasn't on my end, but an issue with the DTRPG servers.

I'd been releasing these Tweak & Toss short "whatevers" as PWYW, but I decided this time that I''ll go ahead a slap a price on this. It has always been my belief that generally people value what they pay for and while I deliberately put a lot of content up for free/PWYW, I'm sitting at almost 97% of the Frugal GM content being free, and the actual number of downloads for this year beats all other years combined.

Basically I don't feel too guilty for pricing this double-sized Tweak &Toss out......but....for a week I have a special Frugal GM discount for 1/2 off. If you want to pick up The Horrors of Halfling Hollow for 99¢ sometime before DTRPG says the week is up use this link.

That link is good until sometime on September 19th. Afterwards you can use this "regular" link or click on either the lead-in graphic or the cover image to get to the listing on DTRPG.

My current Patrons get this Tweak & Toss for free.....

Problems Uploading the new Tweak &Toss Cover

Since I'm already a bit late on the latest Tweak &Toss I decided to double the size from 4 pages to 8....mostly because I didn't like the size of the one map.

Of course this meant that I "had" to make a second map and do some things I haven't done before, but I think it works.

It would be up on DTRPG right now, but for some reason it won't let me load the *^#%#!@ cover image. I messed up at first by trying to upload the wrong type of image (PNG instead of a JPG or GIF), but that should be so easily remedied.....

..at this point I don't know if it is a DTRPG issue or something on my end. I've already followed all of the one line of instructions and attempted to re-upload the correct format image (like 5 times). An email has been sent off and it'll get straightened out while I'm at work.

Until then all I can do it let you guys know what is going on and show you what I can't show the world at DTRPG: