Author: Saul Alexander

Just GMed a “Xmas Family Dungeon World” session for six members of my extended family. We played for four hours and I was on my (bare) feet the whole time. They’re really sore now, but it seems as though everyone had a good time!

A question for the brains trust.

Background: My day job is teaching game design and screenwriting to undergraduates at a private college. I’ve used a little bit of D&D in the game design class before (and Lasers and Feelings, on one memorable occasion when Grant Howitt guest-lectured), but I’ve decided I want to try incorporating more RPGs into both classes. (I’m hoping this will be both a motivating factor for my students, as well as a fun way to reinforce a wide variety of ideas about game mechanics, player experience, creativity, storytelling and so on.)

The question: What game or games would you use to teach either screenwriting or game design (or both) if you were in my position?

Congrats on hitting $650 on the patreon! Really looking forward to those special issues. I assume they’ll be done by Xmas =D

Seems like a bundle relevant to the Gauntlet’s interests: Goblin Quest, Mortal Coil, Cryptomancer, Worlds in Peril, Fellowship, etc.

https://bundleofholding.com/presents/Cornucopia4

So even though I haven’t run Dungeon World yet, I guess marinating in it for the last few weeks has had an impact on me, because I had a DW dream.

I was at some unknown gathering where I was staying overnight at this house with a bunch of people, and I convinced two of them to give DW a try. There were numerous “real world” interruptions from other people in the dream, but we got through a little chunk of play. This is how it went:

The two characters were travelling along this extremely steep cliff. One of the players said that her character (a fighter) was “looking around”. I asked her to give a slightly more detailed fictional description, and she did. I don’t remember quite what she said, but I remember liking it, and I called for a Discern Realities. Unfortunately she whiffed it, so I described how she lost her footing while searching, and called for a Defy Danger (Dex) to regain it. She failed again and went tumbling down the slope, taking b[2d10] damage.

I think it was at this point that I realised/revealed that the entire cliff face was actually the body of a giant, and that the giant was stirring and lifting itself up. (There was also an interlude somewhere around here where an old guy came and expressed some interest in the game, being surprised at how quickly and dynamically it played. This was also where we learned what the character’s names were, I think, although I don’t recall them.)

Anyway: his friend’s body tumbling away from him at high speed, I asked the other player “what do you do?”.

His response was: “I throw a grenade”. This gave me pause for a moment, but then I realised that he was somehow playing a class that came equipped with a crude explosive, so he could essentially do just that. (Does such a playbook exist? I might have to make it.)

Anyway: I thought at first that he was aiming to hurt his companion with the grenade, so I was going to call for an interfere from her to disrupt his attempt. But no – he explained to me that his goal was to blow open the giant’s stomach, so that his friend could have a nice soft (but messy) landing. Nice!

He rolled (Defy Danger +Wis I think, although I’m a bit fuzzy on my reasoning) and he got a 7-9. So I ruled that his plan came off – the beast’s guts blew up everywhere and his companion plopped “safely” into its stomach cavity. But now the creature was swaying wildly, threatening to topple and throw our other hero to his doom…

“What do you do?” I asked.

(Anyone else have any good RPG dreams to relate?)