Questing Beast

The Blog Glatisant

Roll Windows

These days I mostly post on my Substack, but I thought I’d share this one here.

Three months ago I ran a poll over at Questing Beast looking how GMs actually handle when to roll, and it turns out some approaches are much more popular than others.

I’ve given each approach a name: Wide, Low, High, and Narrow. The names come from the fact that each of them creates a different “roll window” within which it’s permissible for the GM to call for a roll rather than just declaring the result. It’s easiest to see this by looking at the visualization below.

Wide Roll Window: “There’s Always a Chance.”

  • Popularity: 19%
  • Roll frequency: High. Only forgo rolling when the task is completely trivial or utterly impossible.
  • Motivation: Fairness and a desire to simulate the world.
  • Upsides:
    • The chance of success or failure might be extremely small, but those rare outcomes might make the game more memorable.
    • Great for groups that love engaging with the game mechanics and optimizing their characters.
  • Downsides:
    • All of the rolling takes up time and can make the game feel like it’s governed more by chance than by the players’ choices.
    • Players might focus on their character sheet more than the situation at hand.

Low Roll Window: “Prepare to Die.”

  • Popularity: 12%
  • Roll frequency: Moderate. Very easy tasks require a roll to succeed, but very hard tasks automatically fail.
  • Motivation: Tension, fear.
  • Upsides:
    • This probably works best for horror or grimdark games where you want things to always be getting worse and for the players to really struggle to succeed.
    • Good for players who enjoy “hardcore mode.”
  • Downsides:
    • The players may not like having the odds tipped against them and might perceive the GM to be antagonistic.
    • Requires strong group buy-in.

High Roll Window: “You are the Chosen One.”

  • Popularity: 55%
  • Roll frequency: Moderate. Very easy tasks automatically succeed and you are allowed a roll in very hard situations.
  • Motivation: Power, forward momentum.
  • Upsides:
    • Most players enjoy the game being tipped in their favor, making this by far the most popular window and what most consider to be “good GMing.”
    • Auto-passing very easy rolls keeps things moving quickly, and allowing rolls for very hard tasks makes players feel like anything is possible.
    • Works well for the heroic or action genres.
  • Downsides:
    • Allowing the players to roll their way out of very hard situations makes it harder to evoke real danger. Rather than treating threats seriously, players may depend on their character’s stats to save them.
    • It may push players towards acting rather than thinking. If high rolls can always win the day, then there’s less incentive to negotiate, prepare, or avoid confrontation altogether.
    • Players might feel that this approach makes their victories feel less earned.

Narrow Roll Window: “Think Your Way Out.”

  • Popularity: 14%
  • Roll frequency: Low. Very easy tasks automatically succeed and very hard tasks automatically fail.
  • Motivation: In-world problem solving, prioritizing player skill over character skill.
  • Upsides:
    • The least amount of rolling, so the game moves the fastest.
    • Rolling is often used as a way to abstract away the player’s engagement with the world. Shrinking the roll window encourages interaction and gives players a greater sense of control over their characters.
    • If very hard tasks automatically fail, you get less “Hail Mary” play, where players ask to roll for highly implausible actions to see if they work. You can just tell them that the attempt would fail and move on. This window imposes more limits on players’ actions, but limitations breed creativity.
    • It’s the window that incentivizes thinking the most. If very easy tasks automatically succeed, that pushes players to try to come up with smart plans that reduce or eliminate risk. When players want to try something very hard you can say, “That’s going to automatically fail unless you have a solid plan. And if your plan is good enough, it’ll just work.”
  • Downsides:
    • The game feels less “realistic” since you aren’t getting to roll for that 1% chance of success that Moldvay recommends.
    • It relies more on GM fiat than other windows, because the GM makes more calls on what counts as “very easy” and “very hard”, which some people won’t like. It’s a high-trust style that requires buy-in.

And that’s the real question, isn’t it? What counts as “very easy” and “very hard”? I think a task is in those categories when it’s right on the borderline. When I’m pretty sure what the result is going to be, but maybe a roll would make sense…that’s when I just declare the results.

As you might expect, the narrow window is the one I like the best, but the high window can also be fun in the right campaign.

GM’s Day Sale on DriveThruRPG

DriveThruRPG is having one of its biggest sales of the year! Go here for all of the OSR titles on sale, or check out my top picks below.

Also, if you’re not subscribed to my newsletter, you can click here to make sure you’re in the running for my occasional giveaways (this month, it’s a free Special Edition copy of the BREAK!! RPG).

Knave 2e and Summer’s End Now Available!

Knave 2e is publicly available! If you missed out on the Kickstarter, now’s the time to grab a copy. Also newly available is Summer’s End, my collection of 12 one-page adventures to drop into any fantasy RPG campaign.

Get them at DriveThruRPG!

Want to buy physical copies of the books? We have those too!

Get them at Swordfish Islands!

Want to see what’s inside Knave 2e? I’ve made a video walking through it page by page so you can see exactly what you get.

And here’s a look inside Summer’s End:

Thanks for the support!

The History of OSR ENNIE Awards

With the recent release of the 2021 ENNIE Award nominations (The Waking of Willowby Hall was nominated for Best Adventure!), I thought I’d take a look back through the award’s history to see how the OSR has historically fared. I’ve listed all OSR and OSR-adjacent products that have been nominated since 2010 below. If they have 1 star, they won silver in their category. If they have 2 stars, they won gold. Of course, what counts as “OSR” is a matter of personal opinion, so other people might count this differently. My list starts at 2010 because prior to that the only OSR-ish products appear to be books by Goodman Games and Necromancer Games, who were using 3.5 for their rules.

2010 – 3 Nominations, 0 Wins
The Grinding Gear – Best Adventure
(Honorable mention) Death Frost Doom – Best Cartography
(Honorable mention) Labyrinth Lord – Best Game

2011 – 2 Nominations, 1 Win
**Old School Hack – Best Free Product
(Honorable mention) Stars Without Number – Best New Game

2012 – 0 Nominations, 0 Wins

2013 – 5 Nominations, 0 Wins
The Magnificent Joop van Ooms – Best Art
Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea – Best Game
Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea – Best Production values
Astonishing Swordsmen and Sorcerers of Hyperborea – Product of the year
Goodman Games – Favorite Publisher

2014 – 1 Nomination, 0 Wins
Old School Monsters Database – Best Software

2015 – 4 Nominations, 4 Wins
*A Red & Pleasant Land – Best Adventure
*A Red & Pleasant Land – Product of the Year
**A Red & Pleasant Land – Best Setting
**A Red & Pleasant Land – Best Writing

2016 – 5 Nominations, 3 Wins
Maze of the Blue Medusa – Best Adventure
*Maze of the Blue Medusa – Best Cartography
**Maze of the Blue Medusa – Best Electronic Book
*Maze of the Blue Medusa – Best Writing
Maze of the Blue Medusa – Product of the Year

2017 – 7 Nominations, 4 Wins
**Broodmother Skyfortress – Judge’s Spotlight
**Blood in the Chocolate – Best Adventure
The Cursed Chateau – Best Cartography
*Veins of the Earth – Best Adversary
Veins of the Earth – Best Rules
*Veins of the Earth – Best Writing
Veins of the Earth – Product of the Year

2018 – 15 Nominations, 8 Wins
Fever Swamp – Judge’s Spotlight
Operation Unfathomable – Judge’s Spotlight
**The Dark of Hot Springs Island – Best Adventure
*Frostbitten and Mutilated – Best Interior Art
**The Midderlands – Best Cartography
*Scenario from Ontario – Best Electronic Book
Vaginas Are Magic – Best Free Product
**Frostbitten and Mutilated – Best Monster
Rey and Kiel Can Do – Best Podcast
Hobbs and Friends of the OSR – Best Podcast
*Fear of a Black Dragon – Best Podcast
*Frostbitten and Mutilated – Best Setting
*Frostbitten and Mutilated – Best Writing
The Dark of Hot Springs Island – Product of the Year
Frostbitten and Mutilated – Product of the Year

2019 – 17 Nominations, 5 Wins
The Stygian Library – Judge’s Spotlight
*Mothership: Dead Planet – Best Adventure
Winter’s Daughter – Best Adventure
Winter’s daughter – Best Cover art
*A New Map of Hot Springs Island – Cartography
Silent Titans – Cartography
Midderlands Expanded – Cartography
*The Ultraviolet Grasslands – Best Free Product
**Mothership – Best Game
*The Black Hack 2nd Edition – Best Layout/Design
Questing Beast – Best Online Content
Silent Titans – Best Production Values
Mothership – Best Rules
Silent Titans – Best Writing
Troika – Best Writing
Mothership – Product of the year
Silent Titans – Product of the year

2020 – 19 Nominations, 11 Wins
**A Pound of Flesh – Best Adventure
The Halls of Arden Vul Complete – Best Adventure
*Trilemma Adventures – Best Adventure
*Ultraviolet Grasslands – Best Cover Art
**Ultraviolet Grasslands – Best Interior Art
**Trilemma Adventures – Best Cartography
*Tunnel Goons – Best Free Game
*Mork Borg – Best Game
*A Pound of Flesh – Best Layout
**Mork Borg – Best Layout
Trilemma Adventures – Best Layout
Worm Witch – Best Monster
Old School Essentials Generators – Best Online Content
Appendix N Book Club – Best Podcast
Rakehell – Best Setting
Electric Bastionland – Best Writing
**Mork Borg – Best Writing
**Mork Borg – Product of the Year
Trilemma Adventures – Product of the Year

2021 – 16 Nominations, ? Wins
The Waking of Willowby Hall – Best Adventure
Halls of the Blood King – Best Adventure
DNDNGEN – Best Aid/Accessory – Digital
Neverland – Best Art, Cover
Neverland – Best Art, Interior
Halls of the Blood King – Best Cartography
Undying Sands – Best Cartography
Mausritter: Boxed Set – Best Family Game/Product
The Stygian Library: Remastered – Best Layout and Design
DNDNGEN – Best Online Content
Worldbuilder’s Notebook – Best RPG Related Product
The Stygian Library: Remastered – Best Setting
Undying Sands – Best Setting
MÖRK BORG CULT: Feretory – Best Supplement
The Stygian Library: Remastered – Best Writing
The Stygian Library: Remastered – Product of the Year

NOTES

In 2020 the OSR had almost 17% of all ENNIE nominations and 26% of all wins (and it would be even higher if I included OSR-inspired stuff like Labyrinth). 2020 was also the peak of a seven year run where the number of OSR nominations increased year after year.

I would be curious to see how Forge-derived games or storygames have done over time (my impression is that they have become much more popular in recent years) but I don’t know enough about them to tell which books would fall into that category.

The Adventure Game Through History

In a previous post I talked about my preference for the term Adventure Game over OSR. In some ways I like it better than the term RPG as well. I was gratified to find that the person who invented the whole genre (David Wesely) felt the same way.

Since then, I’ve been on the lookout for instances of RPGs being called Adventure Games. Some of the first examples were in D&D. The Moldvay/Cook boxed sets put it right on their covers, and subsequent beginners boxes used it as well. It even ended up on the spines of AD&D books.

Since then, it has mostly be used to refer to beginner boxed sets, I assume because Adventure Game is much easier to grasp than Roleplaying Game if you’re a parent looking to buy something for your kid.

However, in recent years it’s begun to show up more frequently on games where it isn’t code for RPG-lite. This is especially true in the Old-School Sphere.

What other examples of RPGs being labelled “Adventure Games” are out there? How do you feel about this trend?

Vote for Labyrinth at the ENnies!

Voting for the ENnie awards is open now, and my RPG Labyrinth: The Adventure Game is nominated for two categories – Best Family Game and Best Cartography! To vote, just go to those categories here and give Labyrinth a “1”. You can also vote for Questing Beast in the Fan Favorite Publisher category. Remember to leave blank any entries that you don’t like, as assigning a number always improves an entry’s ranking.

Lots of other OSR products have been nominated this year, including:

BEST ADVENTURE: A Pound of Flesh, Trilemma Adventures, The Halls of Arden Vul Complete
BEST ART, COVER: The Ultraviolet Grasslands
BEST ART, INTERIOR: The Ultraviolet Grasslands
BEST CARTOGRAPHY: Trilemma Adventures
BEST FREE GAME: Tunnel Goons
BEST GAME: MÖRK BORG
BEST LAYOUT AND DESIGN: A Pound of Flesh, Trilemma Adventures, MÖRK BORG
BEST MONSTER: Worm Witch
BEST ONLINE CONTENT: Essentials Generators
BEST PODCAST: Appendix N Book Club
BEST SETTING: Rakehell
BEST WRITING: Electric Bastionland, MÖRK BORG
PRODUCT OF THE YEAR: Trilemma Adventures, MÖRK BORG

Sea of Thieves: The Best OSR Combat Game?

I’m now playing Sea of Thieves for about 4 hours a day. Playing solo is awful, but with a crew of close friends/family members, it’s transcendent. A huge part of that is the ship battles, which can be approached with an intensely OSR sense of creative mayhem. There’s so many many strategies you can employ to take out someone’s ship, but even when you do it expertly (which I am very bad at) you’re on these large, fast vessels with a lot of Patrick Stuart’s held kinetic energy so there’s so many variables and ways for things to go wrong.

When you shoot cannons at enemy ships you want to hit them below the waterline, but that’s tricky because both ships are moving up and down on the waves as you move. You can also shoot down their masts to slow them, blast enemy PCs off the deck or shoot firebombs to light their ship on fire (which spreads). There are also magical cannonballs that can drop their anchor, seal all their supply barrels, make them all drunk, dance, sleep, or lame, or break their cannons. Each ship has harpoon guns on the front that you can use to latch on to enemy ships to pull them in, or reel in treasure, allies, or enemies in range. When you get hit below the waterline, water starts pouring in the hole which you have to patch by hand and then bail by scooping water into a bucket and throwing it over the side. BUT you might want a little bit of a leak because you can use it to put out fire on deck, or bail the water ONTO THE OTHER BOAT. There are barrels of gunpowder you can drop over the side and hope that enemy ships hit them, or you can swim one over to their boat, climb on board, and then blow it up. You can load yourself into your own cannons and have a friend FIRE YOU ONTO ENEMY SHIPS from 100 yards away.

The game’s an amazing story generator. Instead of giving you game mechanics to manipulate and attack numbers that go up, the game just gives you tons of tools that you can use creatively and then waits to see who is going to be the cleverest. All the canons in the game do the same damage, all ships of the same class go the same speed. You don’t level up your character, you level up your real-world strategic skills.

There’s basically no HUD in the game. Everything has to be done physically. To know wind direction you look up at the sky, to know what direction you’re facing you have to pull out a compass, to navigate you have to look at a map on a table.

It’s also an extremely cooperative game and pretty easy to learn, so it’s ideal for hanging out with people in isolation who maybe don’t play many video games. You have to work together to even sail the ship effectively (steering, charting a course, adjusting the sails, scanning the horizon for enemies or floating barrels etc.) so you’re always talking to each other and doing something. You can play it super cheap for a month by paying $1 for an XBOX game pass (which works for PC as well) and then cancelling before the end of the first month. I might end up just buying it though.

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