Blogs

Design progress, playtest reports, and gaming thoughts

Love & Barbed Wire

December 31, 2019

My next game project that I am working on is set further back in time, during the first world war - the Great War. The quotes in this blog are from real letters written at that time.
(6 minutes read)

Retro Rulemaking

December 5, 2019

It turns out that I've been interested in game design since my very earliest days as a gamer. Back in 1975 I read a review of Dungeons & Dragons, couldn't afford a copy, so wrote my own rules that I played with my brother and some friends!
(4 minutes read)

Evolution of a website

September 21, 2019

Changes to the technology underlying this site from Wordpress, to Ghost, to Jekyll
(7 minutes read)

Kickstarter - Planning Funding v2.0

April 14, 2019

I’m working out the funding for a kickstarter again, and once more it is proving complex to get a really clear view on what the target goal should be. I’ve found it necessary to distinguish between my ‘kickstarter target’ and my ‘profit target’
(3 minutes read)

Lonely Courage Playtesting

February 19, 2019

Here are some stories from people who have played the game. The first one is based on the kitchen table recording which can be downloaded on this site. The following ones were told as part of three of the playtests of A Cool and Lonely Courage at Metatopia 2018.
(9 minutes read)

Stories of Lonely Courage

November 19, 2018

Starguild - Underbelly Setting Dials

August 6, 2018

What kind of power level do you want cybernetics and psionics to have in your Starguild game? Whether you like rare and dangerous or powers that wouldn’t look out of place in a superhero movie, Adventures in the Underbelly has you covered.
(2 minutes read)

Starguild - What do psionic powers look like?

July 16, 2018

Psychic powers cover a wide range of science fiction mental powers. They are broadly divided into six disciplines, each of which have a number of talents which can be gained within them.
(3 minutes read)

Starguild - What Do Cybernetics Look Like?

May 22, 2018

Cybernetics are man-machine interfaces of one kind or another. Characters and opponents can use money to build in additional capabilities of one kind or another, but at a cost – every bit of tech embedded in you causes you to lose a little bit of humanity. And when the chips are down, the horror of what you have done to your body can cost you dear.
(2 minutes read)

Starguild - core game design

November 26, 2017

In this page I describe the fundamentals of the Starguild game - backgrounds, ability scores, skills, saves and Non-Player Characters
(24 minutes read)

Starguild - game influences

September 8, 2017

When setting out to write an RPG, it is useful to consider all the influences which you have had along the way. Starguild was a long time in the making, and these are some of the key things which affected design decisions about what I was doing.
(9 minutes read)

Starguild - professional art on the pages

June 8, 2016

As a result of the successful kickstarter, art is coming in from the three main artists that I have commissioned. These page excerpts show their work and my goodness I'm pleased with the way things are coming along. Great art really does lift a book!
(1 minutes read)