How to Run a Horror One-Shot RPG on The Gaming Gang Dispatch EP 1115

[@BLynn]

I thought maybe they were trying to imply something in The House That Screamed trailer that they couldn't show without an "X" rating at the time.

[@matthewconstantine5015]

I love most of Free League's games, or at least the ones I've read/played. But yeah. I'm nervous about some of the behind the scenes stuff with them.

[@SteveDahlskog]

What are you nervous about?

[@matthewconstantine5015]

​@@SteveDahlskog I'm nervous about unsustainable growth. It seems like a LOT of new games, especially licensed games, in a very short amount of time. I was around in the 90s when companies were doing the same thing, acquiring the rights to lots of properties and churning out games. Very few of those companies remain. Fewer, if any, of those games remain. When you see new game after new game announced, but expansions for the ones you've already got seem to be taking forever to even be announced, much less released, you start to wonder what the point of getting a new game is if maybe it's not going to be supported. For example, I thought there was going to be a "Space Truckers" book for Alien, which is *the* thing I'm most interested in, but it's been 4 years and I haven't heard anything. And now a 2nd Ed is in the works? Is this going to be Fading Suns again, 30 years and 4 editions and still no 3rd book for the War in Heaven series? And I'd love to see some more Tales from the Loop adventures, or any Things from the Flood adventures. Or a reprint of Things from the Flood. I'm curious about The Electric State, but not really inclined to pick it up, after Things from the Flood seems to have been abandoned upon release. Add to that the frequent complaints I've heard from a number of people about late, lost, or never shipped orders from Free League warehouses (I haven't ordered direct, so have no experience, but I trust the voices that have complained). From the outside, as someone who has been in the hobby for almost 40 years & worked in publishing, retail, and distribution for 35 years, it has the look of an unsustainable growth model without the needed underlying structure, likely to collapse at some point. At least, that's been the trajectory of other companies I've watched that have appeared to grow in a similar way (see also: Disney & the Marvel Cinematic Universe). I sure a hell hope not, because Free League is making some of my absolute favorite stuff. But I worry. And this means my excitement for announcements from the company has diminished substantially over the last couple years, even when what is announced should get me excited. Heck, I still haven't picked up Blade Runner, and that seems crazy to me. Yet I haven't been able to get very excited about it. It's not at the Peterson Games point of running Kickstarters to try to finish off long unfulfilled previous products (aka "robbing Peter to pay Paul") levels. But, again from an outsider's view, it looks like things might be in danger of sliding in that direction. Plus the curse of licensed games, where sometimes the IP changes company hands every 3 to 6 years (see: Star Wars, Conan, Lord of the Rings, etc.). To be melodramatic, there's a hint of the inevitable in the air, which tempers excitement, like when a friend starts dating someone you know is really bad for them, but you still love your friend. So you begin to wait for problems you sense coming instead of being happy to spend time with your friend.

[@SteveDahlskog]

@@matthewconstantine5015 Thanks for sharing your thoughts! I agree that Things from the Flood (TFtF) hasn't received any love! I understand your worry but I'm not *as worried* since the FL products are in effect produced by different people (even though Thomas, Nils and Nils put their QA on everything). Several of these people have produced things for several decades here in Sweden. So for example: Forbidden Lands: Erik Granström and Magnus Seter Bladerunner: Joe LeFavi Alien: Andrew E.C. Gaska Coriolis: Nils Karlén and Kosta Kostulas TftL+TftF: Nils Hintze, Nils Karlén and Simon Stålenhag The One Ring: Francesco Nepitello and a lot of others Twilight 2000: Thomas Härenstam and the old Twilight 2000 authors Vaesen: Nils Hintze + several Symbaroum: Mattias Johnsson, Mattias Lilja If you check back over time I think there is at least one release for each line of games. Take care and happy gaming!

[@iannicholson5107]

One hates to use an Americanism but you have been hitting it out of the park of late whatever that means. Lovely to see the colonialists do so well. Splendid, carry on.

[@mohnkern]

Flp commentary still going up today?

[@RedDiceDiaries]

Yeah, I ran a Trail of Cthulhu one shot the other day (although we did a separate character gen session before, I think in future I'll do pregens), it was pretty fun, but I don't think the one shot format leant itself well to the investigative nature of the game since we had to rush through it a bit. Still, everyone had a good time 🙂👍

[@RedDiceDiaries]

Agree with what you say about keeping people around till the end, we had a character fail a succession of sanity checks right at the start of the game. Instead of having the character effectively be removed from the game, I just have that PC a series of strange visions and revelations which impacted the character but also provided some clues.

[@johnsnyder4653]

@@RedDiceDiaries Nice! Call of Cthulhu can be its own worst enemy at times. Plus no one wants a PC kicked out of the game so soon. Good call! Make it weird and give them some situation to deal with is way more interesting and fun. Plus it makes them a wild card for behavior (if role played well). (totally stealing this idea)

[@RedDiceDiaries]

@@johnsnyder4653 : Yeah it seemed to work pretty well and it was better than the player sitting out or having to gen a new character since we only had 3 hours to play the session in 👍

[@SteveDahlskog]

Either the marketing team watched this video and deemed the criticism correct or I don’t know because The Gaming Gang’s review of Vaesen is on the top of the video reviews.

[@Thegaminggang]

They added the video after my email to them and a reply from Tomas at FLP. ~ Jeff

[@matthewconstantine5015]

I don't understand Andres McMeel. They keep saying they're getting out of RPGs, but then announcing new RPGs and more material for the ones they've made. It feels like a company where one hand doesn't know what the other is doing.