Hey all, new member here.

Hey all, new member here.

Hey all, new member here. I’ve had a couple of people point me this direction in regard to the game I’m designing, called Journey Away. I’m running a Kickstarter for it and some folks on multiple platforms have asked me why I didn’t have testimonials from podcasters, and the answer was that I don’t know any and figured cold-calling was bad form and intrusive. Even so, I’ve been encouraged to come check this place out and see what happens. I’ll drop a link to the Kickstarter at the end of this post, but I also don’t want to show up and just plug my project without talking about anything else, so…

Hi! I’m Jacob, a fledgling new game designer in Minnesota, trying to launch a career. I have a couple of weekly gaming groups (one D&D 5E, one that rotates games), and as of yesterday I convinced my wife to let me run a private game for just the two of us; I’ll have a DMPC and we’ll be roaming the wilds of D&D as an awesome battle couple. 😀

What kinds of games do the rest of you like? What’s this community all about? I look forward to getting to know y’all!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1537872810/journey-away-a-non-challenge-based-fantasy-rpg

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1537872810/journey-away-a-non-challenge-based-fantasy-rpg

28 thoughts on “Hey all, new member here.”

  3. Jacob Kellogg welcome! We love to play games, all sorts. I have a tendency to PbtA and GM Full story games, but not limited to those. For example I am running 2 campaigns of Dungeon World, a game of Apocalypse World (soon to be 2 as well), playing in a playtest of Hack the Planet, a game of Changeling the Dreaming, and a playtest of Sea of Stars. This past weekend, at New Mexicon, I ran Fall of Magic and Dialect; and played in Monsterhearts, Masks and Burning Wheel. If you want to see some of the games we play, we have a companion community, Gauntlet Hangouts, or our site to sign up for games we run online, gauntlet-hangouts.firebaseapp.com. We run over 100 sessions a month.

    gauntlet-hangouts.firebaseapp.com – Gauntlet Hangouts

  4. Jacob Kellogg welcome! We love to play games, all sorts. I have a tendency to PbtA and GM Full story games, but not limited to those. For example I am running 2 campaigns of Dungeon World, a game of Apocalypse World (soon to be 2 as well), playing in a playtest of Hack the Planet, a game of Changeling the Dreaming, and a playtest of Sea of Stars. This past weekend, at New Mexicon, I ran Fall of Magic and Dialect; and played in Monsterhearts, Masks and Burning Wheel. If you want to see some of the games we play, we have a companion community, Gauntlet Hangouts, or our site to sign up for games we run online, gauntlet-hangouts.firebaseapp.com. We run over 100 sessions a month.

    gauntlet-hangouts.firebaseapp.com – Gauntlet Hangouts

  7. Hey Jacob! Welcome to the community! We hope you stick around, get to know us, and play games with us even if you did originally find us to share your product! Do you listen to any of our podcasts? How did you find out about us?

  8. Hey Jacob! Welcome to the community! We hope you stick around, get to know us, and play games with us even if you did originally find us to share your product! Do you listen to any of our podcasts? How did you find out about us?

  9. David LaFreniere I’ve only just found you, so I haven’t listened to any podcasts. The other day, I vented some feels on social media, and a couple different people said I should check this place out. So, here I am. 😁

  10. David LaFreniere I’ve only just found you, so I haven’t listened to any podcasts. The other day, I vented some feels on social media, and a couple different people said I should check this place out. So, here I am. 😁

  11. Hey –

    I posted on the Misdirected Mark Productions google plus page that they should interview you on their podcast. And of course it would be cool if you were interviewed on one of the Guantlet podcasts too.

    I heard about your game, but I want to know more – what is a non-challenge RPG?

  12. Hey –

    I posted on the Misdirected Mark Productions google plus page that they should interview you on their podcast. And of course it would be cool if you were interviewed on one of the Guantlet podcasts too.

    I heard about your game, but I want to know more – what is a non-challenge RPG?

  15. Jacob Kellogg Can you unpack that further? Maybe with an example?

    Here’s a situation in Dungeon World:

    I’m a fighter. An orc is charging me. I draw my sword and run to fight him in hand to hand combat. That triggers the Hack and Slash move. I roll 2d6, and depending on result, either I or GM or both narrate what happens.

    How would something like this scenario look in Journey Away?

    Note, I picked a standard trope-y dungeon exploration type scene. May not be appropriate for Journey Away…

  16. Jacob Kellogg Can you unpack that further? Maybe with an example?

    Here’s a situation in Dungeon World:

    I’m a fighter. An orc is charging me. I draw my sword and run to fight him in hand to hand combat. That triggers the Hack and Slash move. I roll 2d6, and depending on result, either I or GM or both narrate what happens.

    How would something like this scenario look in Journey Away?

    Note, I picked a standard trope-y dungeon exploration type scene. May not be appropriate for Journey Away…

  17. Chris Shorb Well, you’re not a fighter and an orc is not charging you. 😉

    You’re exploring the woods, looking for a good spot for camp. You assemble a pool of dice based on helpful traits you have. The GM assembles a pool of dice based on unhelpful traits, circumstances, etc. Both pools are rolled.

    You pair dice between pools. The pairs where your die is higher contribute to boons while the other pairs generate complications.

    The player to your left narrates whichever type of development there are more of, then the player on your right narrates the others.

  18. Chris Shorb Well, you’re not a fighter and an orc is not charging you. 😉

    You’re exploring the woods, looking for a good spot for camp. You assemble a pool of dice based on helpful traits you have. The GM assembles a pool of dice based on unhelpful traits, circumstances, etc. Both pools are rolled.

    You pair dice between pools. The pairs where your die is higher contribute to boons while the other pairs generate complications.

    The player to your left narrates whichever type of development there are more of, then the player on your right narrates the others.

  19. I don’t understand how “looking for a good spot for a camp” is not a challenge. I understand that it is not a violent conflict, but that still seems like a challenge to me, especially if there are two opposing sides.

  20. I don’t understand how “looking for a good spot for a camp” is not a challenge. I understand that it is not a violent conflict, but that still seems like a challenge to me, especially if there are two opposing sides.

  21. Yoshi Creelman You could call it a challenge, but the game doesn’t care about it being a challenge. You can assume you’re successful in finding a good campsite. If you have complications, they can be something like another character showing you up by finding it first, or you step in poison ivy along the way, or really anything.

  22. Yoshi Creelman You could call it a challenge, but the game doesn’t care about it being a challenge. You can assume you’re successful in finding a good campsite. If you have complications, they can be something like another character showing you up by finding it first, or you step in poison ivy along the way, or really anything.

  23. Gotcha, so when you say non-challenge, it’s not that challenges don’t exist, but that you always have control of whether you succeed or not. The game is not concerned with success or failure, but rather using randomness to provide additional interesting unexpected details and complications.

    How do you determine when to roll and find out these unexpected details?

  24. Gotcha, so when you say non-challenge, it’s not that challenges don’t exist, but that you always have control of whether you succeed or not. The game is not concerned with success or failure, but rather using randomness to provide additional interesting unexpected details and complications.

    How do you determine when to roll and find out these unexpected details?

  25. Welcome Jacob Kellogg! To answer your questions – I enjoy a good old fashioned D&D dungeon crawl on occasion, but I tend to run more Dungeon World and World of Darkness these days.

    Good luck on the game with the wife! I’m interested to hear how the DMPC thing goes.

    I recently introduced my girlfriend to Dungeon World, her first RPG, and it went surprisingly well… she loves animals, and chose to play a Druid. She is slowly collecting a following of animal friends. Three sessions in, the party now has a pet pig (rescued from being dinner at an inn), a pony, some purple butterflies (from her homeland), and an owlbear egg she hopes to hatch someday.

  26. Welcome Jacob Kellogg! To answer your questions – I enjoy a good old fashioned D&D dungeon crawl on occasion, but I tend to run more Dungeon World and World of Darkness these days.

    Good luck on the game with the wife! I’m interested to hear how the DMPC thing goes.

    I recently introduced my girlfriend to Dungeon World, her first RPG, and it went surprisingly well… she loves animals, and chose to play a Druid. She is slowly collecting a following of animal friends. Three sessions in, the party now has a pet pig (rescued from being dinner at an inn), a pony, some purple butterflies (from her homeland), and an owlbear egg she hopes to hatch someday.

Comments are closed.