Originally published at The Game That May Be. Please leave any comments there.

I’m back with a new show covering what’s been going on in my various gaming opportunities (Witch Hunters, The Dresden Files RPG, & Star Wars Episode LV) along with an essay on my need to be informed - and my realization that maybe I’m taking that need a bit too far.

Show notes are on the far side of the “Read More.” Enjoy!

P.S. : Happy April Fool’s Day, and Happy Small Favor day!

Originally published at The Game That May Be. Please leave any comments there.

I’ve finally gotten around to the task of re-working the basic character concept I’ve developed for my main The Dresden Files RPG player character, Theo Mendaharin. This is the character I’ve made for the play session I’m going to be in with the crew of The Game Master Show, but I’ve re-tooled some things from the original concept. The biggest change is that I’ve decided to take a suggestion from the folks on the DFRPG Bleeders playtest group and try out a lower skill point pool and a lower skill cap. So, Theo’s skills will be a little less potent than many of the starting characters have been in other playtests so far. The default has been 35 skill points with a cap of Superb, I’m going for either 30 points or 25 points (probably 25) with a cap of Great. If you don’t know what any of that means, look over SotC or listen to Rob and Fred partially explain it on the latest episode of Rob Bohl’s excellent podcast The Independent Insurgency.

The story-descriptors in the phases are currently very sketchy, because I want to weave this guy into the group before I go too much further with the descriptors. So, some aspects may change, and the backstory will expand a bit. But overall, this will give you an idea of the direction I want to take the character.

Without further ado, here is …

Theo Mendaharin

Aspects

High Concept: Disenchanted Wizard

Personal Struggle: The Call of Duty, the Lure of the Road

Background: Better Dead than Red (Grew up in Indy, mentor and family killed by Red Court, had to kill some of his own family after they were turned)

Rising Conflict: I’ve Seen Things You People Wouldn’t Believe (wandering soul, worldwalker, misfit)

First Story: I Know She’s Out There Somewhere (lost love who may now be a Red Vampire)

Guest 1: I Touch the Fire and It Freezes Me (Theo has lost so much and become so jaded that he just wants to walk away and wander the Nevernever, the only place he feels any emotional resonance)

Guest 2: The Heavy Grey Cloak (Vampire War and shortage of wardens forces White Council to appoint Theo as Warden of Indianapolis, so he must stay and protect his city.)

Skills (30 pts):

• GREAT: [2] – Discipline Alertness
• GOOD: [3] – Weapons Athletics Lore
• FAIR: [4] – Intimidation Conviction Presence Fists
• AVG: [5] – Resources Rapport Endurance Contacts Investigation

Stunts/Permissions/Powers

• Wizard
• The Sight
• Soulgaze
• Wizard’s Constitution
• Evocation: Spirit-focused
• Thaumaturgy

Originally published at The Game That May Be. Please leave any comments there.

Episode 3 of TGTMB is my love letter to the Fate system. We start with a short “at my table” clarification, then move on to a fly-on-the-wall peek into my recent Vegas After Midnight planning session with David Moore. I close with an overview of my impressions thus far of the Dresden Files RPG bleeding alpha playtest, with a particular focus on Aspects.

For this week’s notes and links, follow the link below.

Originally published at The Game That May Be. Please leave any comments there.

Last week, Fred Hicks sent a note to the alpha playtest folks requesting we report in on our progress with playtesting thus far. I’ve been poring through the playtest docs and dreaming up characters and situations, but as of Fred’s note, hadn’t done any actual interactive playtesting with David and Mario and the TGMS crew.

So I jotted this silly little ditty to the DFRPG group in response to Fred’s request on March 13th:

I’m making a wizard, I’ll have him posted over the weekend.

I’m poking the TGMS guys to get our DFRPG play started. I think we’re going to try to do something tomorrow night, if we can gather enough of the gang. If that doesn’t pan out, I’m going to go off my meds, allow my multiple personalities to re-emerge, and form my own play group made up entirely of them. [He’s joking. No, I’m NOT joking, shut up! Knock it off, you guys, you’re going to scare all these people. Hey, you’re the one that mentioned us in the first place, asshat, so YOU knock it off.]

Desperate times call for desperate measures. I WILL play this *&^%$ game and offer some feedback and commentary. <grin>

Seriously, though, my next podcast is pretty much devoted entirely to Fate, with some of my DFRPG impressions included. I’ll record it and post it by Monday. And I will be using all my Agitator talents (including this post) to get some AP going ASAP.

Well, Friday night, we DID get to do some character creation. The TGMS “we”, I mean - not the multiple-personality-Mick “we”. David and the gang set everything up in the basement, including a rig that allowed them to see and hear me via Skype, and me to do likewise on my end of the connection. And the best surprise was that David was able to get our buddy Chris Miller in via Skype the same way.

So earlier today I was able to update the DFRPG group with this note:

TGMS crew update:

Our Skype video/audio setup worked, and DFRPG character creation is underway. David and I had to contend with a couple of guys who have no experience with the Dresdenverse, very little experience with Fate, and no gumption to read the playtest docs, so it was slow going but I had a blast anyway, and I feel like David is cooking up something interesting now that we’ve begun to establish a baseline for what we want out of our mini-saga.

The biggest and most interesting part, in my opinion, is that we decided that our original two options for city location were not right for us. Gary, Indiana is just too close to Chicago, and Louisville, well, we’re conceding that territory to Mark and the gang. So instead, we’re going with Indianapolis. David and I are going to work up a Dresdenized version of Indy and, as I understand it, we will be playing our storyline in late summer … mid-August, to be precise.

Unless someone changes his or her concept, at this point we’ve got a wizard (me), a changeling with ogre blood (Shaun), a ghost (Dan), a mortal librarian (Chris Miller) and a mermaid (Erin). Mario was not able to attend, hopefully he’ll be there when we finish chargen this week. David’s also creating a changeling who will be a prominent NPC.

I’m psyched. And gee, I’m glad I don’t have to rely on my multiple personalities to play with me.

More info soon.

Now, to wrap this up - if you’re interested, I will be posting info about my new wizard character here on TGTMB once he’s polished enough for public viewing, and I do hope to release a Fate-centric episode of TGTMB by Monday (Tuesday at the latest).

Originally published at The Game That May Be. You can comment here or there.

I’m finally finding the time to take advantage of the fact that I’m one of those rarified souls who is “bleeding for The Dresden Files RPG” by taking part in the alpha playtest of the emerging system, and over the past few days I’ve been doing a lot of reading and some writing, including what I’m calling my “minority report” write-up for the Dresdenized version of Metro Louisville (the Rolemonkeys are developing the “group” version). In the process of coming up with my own spin on the city write-up, I realized I want to do it from the point-of-view of a character who knows the city well, and so I formed just such a character in my mind. Then, Fred Hicks released a draft of the supernatural stunts and powers chapter to the DFRPG Bleeders group, and I decided it was the perfect time to try it out by actually designing the character who is authoring my version of the Louisville overview.

It is liberating, interesting, challenging, and frustrating to be doing this pretty much on my own. I think overall I do better when my creativity unfolds in collaboration with others. But this is essentially the situation I’ve chosen for myself (although in a few weeks I think I’ll be collaborating with the TGMS crew on their Dresden playtesting) and for now, I’m sort of representing those few potential roleplayers who might buy the DFRPG and use it lone-wolf style, without a group. There probably won’t be a lot of those, but I imagine there will be a few, because I’d be that guy if I were in that situation. I’ve made characters for several of the rpgs I own but haven’t played, because for me, that’s the most effective way to find out what I like or don’t like about a game.