Harley Wins D&D

It gets lost in the hubbub ever since Gen Con moved to Indianapolis, but each year the folks of TSR get together in a bar in Lake Geneva to decide the year's "Game Wizard," aka the coveted "I Won D&D" award. The last few years I've been slighted (the 2012 award went to +Jon Marr for the video where his giggling daughter was crushed to death beneath the DCC corebook; the year before went to +Erik Jensen for when he DM'd the game where his son turned a town of ghosts into giraffes). 
But this year, I think I'm in the running. 
Submitted on my behalf by a fifth grader in one of my playtest groups: 

You should be able to click to enlarge. Here's the translation from the caption:

"The sad moment when you realize you wasted all your ammunition on the first monster."

So what might the judges infer about my game?   -D&D is largely interchangeable with DCC.  -Ammunition is finite. When you get a chance, flaming ammo is better.  -It looks like orcs have roughly 12 hp.   -Orcs have weak swords.  -It's okay to kill PCs with hordes of enemies.
I may accomplish nothing else of note, but I helped a 5th grader get excited about D&D. I win. 

'cause gamers are awesome

I attended GenghisCon this weekend as a special guest of the Denver Gamers Association. The event doubled as the kickoff to the Goodman Games convention season, aka the 2013 World Tour. Huge shout out to +Justin Suzuki , +Andy Collier and the rest of the DGA crew for throwing a seriously awesome event. 

I ran three DCC games (playtests for future releases) Saturday and Sunday. Players got clever, I flipped them off (this is turning into a "thing") and intelligent play trumped devious design nearly every time. But that's par for the course; it wasn't until Sunday game that things got memorable.
Sunday morning games are usually your drop slot – when it is a 3-in-6 chance that no one shows and you get to go back to bed. But this morning's DCC gamers proved more determined than most and we sat 7 at a game intended for 6.
And guided by the light of Brother Leo and the twisted machinations of Manse the Black, the PCs dominated some DCC: 

Wendy kicking ass. She's playing a bar bar bar bar bear eee ann 

Child-demon-witches were slain; a universe egg was accidentally cracked opened; Mary the Barbarian killed the party's own wizard (later resurrected as a nascent god); a wicked army was routed by an incredibly determined barbarian, her lover and a thief; and the world's largest thaumaturgic circle succeeded in suckering away the PCs long enough for the bad guys to kidnap the slain-wizard-turned-godling. 
BUT, just as victory was in the PCs' grasp, fate's fell hand played its trump card: the gaming convention fire alarm ...

Fire trucks showed up, guys with hoses ushered us out. Game over. 
But this is where the smaller local con got to shine. Had we been at GenCon, it would have been lights out, thank you for your $5, please go to the next hotel. But not GenghisCon. No effing way. Instead we all grab our PCs, a fistful of dice and a battlemap and finish the game here:

Wendy's PC has now become a pillar of flame. She died.

... on the frickin' lawn cause gamers are just that awesome. Game on. 
+Doug Keester 's wizard, turned nascent god / blank moral slate takes the opportunity to indulge in the philosophy of "do what thou wilt", and decides that that is the whole of the law.  The Wizard transformes Mary the Barbarian into a screaming pillar of fire, deep freezes Merrick the Gambler, scorches someone else (Brother Leo, maybe?) and was well on his way to becoming Master of the Universe, until he was tackled off the top of the ziggurat by Bob the Unknown Warrior, landing at the bottom with ONE HIT POINT, only to be felled by a well-placed dart, hurled by Brother Leo. 
Cause yeah, we do this shit in our heads. And because gamers are awesome.
#DCCRPG #Genghiscon #DGA

First, let 'em Die

Repost, cause I'm an idiot:

This weekend I ran a DCC RPG game for two fourth graders and one dad. As mentioned on G+, my original thought was to not kill any of the PCs. Instead, at 0 HP they'd fall unconscious. Later, they'd be recovered by their comrades, and continue on.

After all, I wanted them to have "fun" right? I'm trying to create life-long gamers, here. 

Well meaning, but very, VERY ass-backwards. 

Fortunately the players' actions forced my hand:

• Beset by a veritable tide of bristling black spiders, Zero the Dwarf leaped into their midst. The tide washed over him, the rest of the PCs bolted, and Zero was never seen again. 
• Parlaying with brigands atop a cliff, Zero Mk II decided to break off negotiations with a magic missile cast at melee range. Zero lost initiative and the brigands charged, pitching Zero to his rocky doom some 50' below.
• Deep beneath the brigand's ruined tower, Jazee the Slave opted to take a stand against a horde of oncoming brigands, with predictable results. 

Each time, the group took a five minute break and had a slice of pizza while I helped the player roll up a new character. (By the end of the session, he could do it solo.) 

The same player lost three characters during our session. Not once did his interest flag. The deaths weren't arbitrary or due to DM fiat – the player made his own decisions and they went poorly. As a result, he grew more focused and (slowly) more cautious with each new PC.

But what if, per my original plan, he had only blacked out, to be revived by his companions at the end of the scene? 

What a boring, trivial game – utterly devoid of player agency, consequence, or reward – that would have been. 

Instead, death was the great motivator. Remove death and what would we have had? Why even act at all? The results would all be the same. 

So, yeah. Thank you Zero, Zero Mk II, Jazee, and finally, Golgoth*. Lesson learned.

Want to convert kids into lifelong gamers? Kill them (rather, let them die) early and often. 

//H

(*Even his names got better.)