#RPGaDay2015 - 11th - Favorite RPG Writer

It's August 2015, and to follow on with the success of last year's #RPGaDay event, David Chapman at Autocratik has created a new list. Each day in August, I'll be posting my "answer" to that day's topic.

This is the toughest question of the month. I had to actually have a conversation with my wife about this one. I started out with five names, and at the end of the conversation, I was only able to narrow it down to three: Shane Hensley, Steve Kenson, and Harley Stroh.

Shane created two of my all-time favorite RPG things, Savage Worlds and Deadlands. He also did a great version of Lankhmar and worked on my favorite D&D setting, Dark Sun, back in the days of TSR. If Shane writes it, I'll buy it.

Steve Kenson wrote what was arguably the first true "next generation" D20 System game, in Mutants & Masterminds. It was also the first supers RPG to rival the classic Champions. More recently he wrote my current favorite supers RPG, Icons.

Harley Stroh is a beautiful, sick and twisted, genius. As one of the key writers for the Dungeon Crawl Classics RPG, his adventures are consistently the most interesting and entertaining, even to read, let alone run or play. Check out Peril on the Purple Planet, it's pretty great stuff.

#RPGaDay2015 - 10th - Favorite RPG Publisher

It's August 2015, and to follow on with the success of last year's #RPGaDay event, David Chapman at Autocratik has created a new list. Each day in August, I'll be posting my "answer" to that day's topic.

I have to assume anyone who knows me could guess this one. Pinnacle Entertainment is not only the publisher of my favorite game system, but honestly it's filled with the highest concentration of the people in the game industry who I call "friend." In addition to all that, though, they are exemplars of how any company—in any industry—should treat the people who pay their bills, their customers.

I'll tell a fun story: A long time ago, I bought some Deadlands books from Pinnacle when they were clearing them out. In fact, I believe Shane was shipping them out of his garage back East at the time. I didn't know him yet, so I can't be sure. There was a mistake in my order. I don't remember the details, but I do remember that for my trouble, Shane threw in an extra set of bennies (I was buying one set already). These were the original Smiling Jack glass bennies, and I still use them at most of my games to this day.

#RPGaDay2015 - 9th - Favorite Media You Wish Was An RPG

It's August 2015, and to follow on with the success of last year's #RPGaDay event, David Chapman at Autocratik has created a new list. Each day in August, I'll be posting my "answer" to that day's topic.

Fell behind again... Real life stuff for the win. 

There is so much crossover these days between RPGs and pretty much every other type of media, this one is tougher than I thought when I first glanced over the topic last month. The answer forces me to call myself out.

Back in 2009, I was re-watching the Doctor Strange animated movie. It was a good movie, as far as I'm concerned—good enough to re-watch, for sure. On my re-watch, I got inspired by the first six minutes. Seriously go watch it if you can. I wanted that RPG. I wanted it so much, I decided I'd create it myself. That little desire gave birth to Fuse, a Savage Worlds setting idea I've wrestled with on and off for nearly six years now. Hopefully one day, you'll get to play it.

#RPGaDay2015 - 8th - Favorite Appearance of RPGs in the Media

It's August 2015, and to follow on with the success of last year's #RPGaDay event, David Chapman at Autocratik has created a new list. Each day in August, I'll be posting my "answer" to that day's topic.

The trouble with RPGs in the media is that media pretty much always feels the need to take a geek-bashing stance on them. That said, I think Community's take on D&D was pretty realistic and still managed to make me laugh quite a bit—I've certainly played in games that came off a lot like the YouTube video below.

Good stuff.

#RPGaDay2015 - 7th - Favorite Free RPG

It's August 2015, and to follow on with the success of last year's #RPGaDay event, David Chapman at Autocratik has created a new list. Each day in August, I'll be posting my "answer" to that day's topic.

Almost caught up...

This is a tough one since really there are so many free RPGs out there. I have to admit I'm a little torn about my answer, as this RPG is technically "Pay What You Want" and I bought it through Kickstarter before the free version hit the interwebs (officially). But if I strip those issues away and go with the RPG that's brought the most fun to my game table, which also happens to be available for free, then I have to go with Fate Core. I've been playing Fate since the release of Spirit of the Century, and I have to say Fate Core is the RPG I anticipated more than any other announced product since D&D 2nd Edition.

Here are my Fate highlights:

• Running Spirit of the Century at a public event in the late '00s
• Running Dresden Files RPG in my home game, soon after its release
• Playing in a weekly Dresden Files RPG/Forbidden Kingdoms hack, run by Jason Corley
• Playing in a weekly Dresden Files RPG, using at-the-time unreleased Fate Core rules, run by Ryan Macklin
• Running my go-to-last-minute Fate Accelerated con game, Quest for the MacGuffin, multiple times
• Running a Fate Accelerated My Little Pony game for my daughter's 10th birthday

#RPGaDay2015 - 6th - Most Recent RPG Played

It's August 2015, and to follow on with the success of last year's #RPGaDay event, David Chapman at Autocratik has created a new list. Each day in August, I'll be posting my "answer" to that day's topic.

I've been running late with these. I'm hoping to use this weekend to play catch-up.

I mentioned recently that I've started playing D&D Encounters. Well, given this came in on a Thursday, and D&D Encounters is a Wednesday event, I'm gonna have to say... wait for it... D&D 5E!

This was an awesome session because my daughter has joined the fray. It was kind of a last minute thing, so she used one of WotC's pre-generated characters. The intention was to get her feet wet with a human fighter then take this week to build some sort of spellcaster. It turns out she had so much fun with the pre-gen, she's keeping the character.

The folks at the table were great with her, and she made me proud with her play. This is a really exciting time for me, as my daughter is really getting into my favorite hobby!

#RPGaDay2015 - 5th - Most Recent RPG Purchase

It's August 2015, and to follow on with the success of last year's #RPGaDay event, David Chapman at Autocratik has created a new list. Each day in August, I'll be posting my "answer" to that day's topic.

My most recent RPG purchase was Titansgrave: The Ashes of Valkana for the Fantasy Age system. I'm a huge fan of Wil Wheaton's TableTop, so when I found out he was doing a show featuring his own setting, I was definitely intrigued. I'm not disappointed in the show or the project. Their both brilliant, and I highly recommend them.