Category: Roleplaying

Ticket to Ride (a professional board game) has won the Diana Jones award for “Excellence in Gaming”, beating the two other nominees, two small-publisher (“indie”) roleplaying games, Dogs in the Vineyard and Code of Unaris.
Now, I blame berevity: calling it an award for “Excellence in Roleplay Gaming” would be too clumsy, even though that was sort-of how the thing was interpreted in past years, as far as I understood the results.
The broadness of the thing does make it look a bit silly, like nominating two indie graphic novels and a cofee-table photography book for an “excellence in visual art” award.
(Shiffer snarked about the award here).

[ via OgreCave ]

A company called Toy Vault makes fuzzy dice for gamers. There’s a detailed list at SJ Games’ Warehouse 23. I wonder how big an entire set of polyhedrals would be.

Don’t Roleplay The Bugs, from The Escapist magazine, is a sad story about a brave GM trying (and failing) to recreate the tabletop D&D experience in Neverwinter Nights. It’s a cool demonstration of the old principal that computers do what you say, not what you mean, and shows how much of a gaming session depends on subtle elements of face-to-face interaction that are completely lost when you try to port the experience to an “immersive” VR.
[ via Ogre Cave ]
Update: The Forge chips in.

This is funny. Long, too: RPGnet Forums – 250 things Mr. Welch can no longer do in a RPG. Some of my faves:

17. Collateral Damage Man is not an appropriate name for a super hero.
21. No longer allowed to recreate the Death Star Trench Run out of genre.
35. I am not allowed to convince the entire party to play R2 units.
37. They do not make black market illegal cyberweapons for rodents.
64. My paladin’s battle cry is not “Good for the Good God”
69. There is more to wizardry than magic missile. Even if I can do 200 damage automatic with no save.
88. My bard does not get a bonus to perform if she is obviously not wearing anything under her tabard.
90. My swashbuckling fop cannot take the flaw Dark Secret: Not Gay
107. There is no such game as Wereshark the Buffet.
122. The paladin’s alignment is not Lawful Anal.
134. The King’s Guards official name is not “The Royal Order of the Red Shirt”
161. I will not nail every single female party member except for the elf chick played by that creepy guy.
191. My character is not related in anyway to Boba Fett. This goes double for Star Wars characters.
219. In formal introductions to royalty, I must not introduce my companions as just “The Other Guys”.

Go read them all.
Pointless update: added some more, because I couldn’t excuse myself for forgetting to put #90 in.