Monday Musings #72 🤬

Doing Panels, and Lifting an extraordinary one-shot.

Good Monday, Gamer!

"Fortune favors the brave, but the dice favor no one." – Sun Tzu, Sage

I spent the weekend deep in RPG nerdom at my local RPG Weekend hosted by Cardboard Corner Cafe in Lenexa, KS. I got to be part of several panels, from "Building Better Villains" to "Player and Table Management" and my personal surprise favorite, "Running Heists & Capers." It was amazing to see such a diverse crowd of ages, genders, and backgrounds—most of whom were hungry to improve their GM skills. I loved seeing the shared passion for creating better game experiences.

One thing that seemed to intrigue folks was my "no-story prep" approach. Instead of protecting a pre-planned story, a villain's master plan, or even keeping players "on track," I go in with an open approach. No story guardrails, no plot armor for the bad guys—just letting the game mechanics and player choices lead the way. It's not "free," though; this approach requires an understanding of the system you're running. If you can use the mechanics to drive the game, you get to watch things unfold organically, which can be way more satisfying for everyone at the table.

The "Running Heists & Capers" panel was a blast, and surprisingly, it ended up being my favorite. Now, heists aren’t usually my thing; I don’t plan elaborate capers for my players. But sometimes, players come to the table with a heist idea, and I just roll with it, using the game’s mechanics to let them resolve their plan. I was talked into joining this panel as the "game system first" voice for heists. What started as a discussion about planning and executing capers turned into a nerdy deep dive on handling heists across various systems and drawing inspiration from other media. Someone even claimed that Lord of the Rings is a caper movie, to which another panelist countered that it’s really a Frodo & Sam road movie. Good times!

New to Me, and ICYMI

• Yochai Gal has an impressive collection of assets on itch.io.

• I’m loving the beautiful and user-friendly mapping tools by Watabou—a treasure trove for any GM who wants a quick map that still looks fantastic.

  

• I've also dipped my toes into Zenless Zone Zero as part of my Gacha gaming explorations (Where’s the TTRPG?!) I'm feeling like the old man in the club—everything looks stunning, but I'm not sure what's happening half the time. My brain is full of thoughts on this whole Gacha phenomenon.

Lifted One-Shot BTS: From Draft to Game Table

Here’s a Behind-the-Scenes, in-the-kitchen look at me cooking up a one-shot adventure for Lifted from the rough draft phase to actual implementation to run at PAXU and beyond!