#ttrpg

It was probably a bit ambitious to read "Aztec Philosophy" as my very first book on philosophy, and thus it took me a long time to finish it. But it was very much worth it, since it allowed me to examine my own Eurocentric perceptions and assumptions on philosophy, metaphysics, cosmology, and so forth. And thus I recommend this book to anyone else who wants to gain a wider perspective on these matters.

Consciously or not (and mostly the latter), most people with an Eurocentric background (including those descended from European settlers) have internalized narratives about the world that are heavily based on both Greek philosophy and Christian theology - and this remains true even for those who have decided to reject Christianity. Aztecs - and other indigenous American people - have long lived in isolation from Europe, and have thus built up their own philosophies and metaphysics which has shaped their understanding of the world in an entirely different way.

Central to Aztec metaphysics is the concept of "teotl" - a divine force (and not energy) that constantly recreates itself in new forms. Everything that was, is, and will be - from rocks and animals, humans, and to the very gods themselves - are merely temporary manifestations of teotl which will eventually decay and dissolve, and then their teotl will manifest in new forms. The goal for humans is then to maintain a good, stable, moderate life on this Earth for long as it will last - for nothing will last forever.

This is the merest gist of the complexities involved, but it is already a huge contrast to the Christian notions of an "eternal, unchanging divine" and the "temporary base matter" of earthly existence - to the Aztecs, there is no fundamental difference between the teotl within a mortal and the teotl within the gods. And while Christian cosmology has a clear beginning and end to Creation, Aztec philosophy does not - existence will always go on, although its form is constantly changing.

Even if you are not a student of philosophy, I recommend this book to #ttrpg players and GMs. For instance, I found that the concept of teotl as described in this work could work surprisingly well for the philosophical underpinnings of "The Force" in #StarWars - it would add some real nuance to the conflicts between the "Dark Side" and the "Light Side". And the concepts within this book could add a lot of nuance and ideas to other settings with complex metaphysics!

You can find a shorter overview article about the concepts explained in this book here:

iep.utm.edu/aztec-philosophy/

I love detailed #ttrpg city books, and at 220 pages in length, Altdorf: Crown of the Empire for #WFRP certainly qualifies. As the capital city of the Empire, Altdorf is full of factions, power groups, NPCs with secrets, and lots of tiny neighborhoods - each with their own character, yet all feel plausible and believable for the setting of the Old World (well, maybe with a few exceptions - the "Popular League Against Nobility and Taxation (PLANT)" revolutionary group reads too much like something from the 20th century rather than the "German Renaissance" atmosphere the setting generally goes for).

So, why didn't I give this book full marks? It isn't for the bad puns in the German-sounding names - as a German WFRP player, I've learned to tolerate these. No, my problem is that this book doesn't really do enough to make its individual parts interconnected.

The setting of Ptolus, as usual, shows how to do this right: Each time a character, a place, an organization or something else has a connection to something done elsewhere, there's a page reference to where you fan find more. As a result, you get the feeling that the city - despite its fantastic nature - is an interconnected, organic whole. In contrast, while Altdorf has a long list of fascinating, atmospheric neighborhoods, they all too often feel as if they exist on their own, with connections to the rest of the city only being hinted at.

Nethertheless, a GM interested in running adventures or even entire campaigns in Altdorf will find plenty of useful material in this book. But they should put in some added effort to make this city feel alive.

#SoloClub #TTRPG

I've been an avid tabletop roleplaying gamer since the Satanic Panic, and while I'd played with using random tables or oracles to try to run solo games to feed my thirst to play, they didn't flow well or reproduce the thrill of "playing to find out". The closest I came to solo roleplaying success might have been old Traveller's character generation, where as I rolled the career that the character went through, I imagined what each roll of the dice meant. What happened during that period of service to get the character that +1 in Bribery? Of course, the fact that a character could die during character creation added some of the surprise or thrill that seemed to be missing from other attempts at solo play. Fast forward to the pandemic in 2020, and even though I had been playing games online for years, I found that because of work and the pandemic, I couldn't often seem to find the time or energy for online sessions. This has made me think about solo gaming both as a form of entertainment and as a way to prep for running games for others: what better way to learn the ropes of a system than to try it out solo first?

Geek Gamers, on the other hand, came to solo roleplaying as a natural step from a childhood: "the way I make up stories comes from years of spending time alone as an only child and using my mind to create other worlds. Often those places had magic. They were always escapes." (p.2)

Later, their love of interactive fiction games (such as Zork), loving RPGs but not having a group to game with. Having a degree in Victorian Literature also seems to have informed Geek Gamers development as a solo RPGer in that they have a solid understanding of how plots develop and scenes are written to be engaging. In their own words, the purpose of this book "is [to] explain some basic tenets of storytelling and narrative and apply them to working with RPG rules, mechanics, and constructs. These are the strategies I turn to in my mind when I’m playing. These are what give my sessions the compelling stories you see developing. And these concepts are what I’ve put into words for you, here in this book." p.2

Even Character Creation is Play Geek Gamers definitely delivers on laying out how to make solo gaming compelling and entertaining. First, they lay out that "Solo RPGing is what you want it to be, not what someone tell you it is." (p9) In other words, they give you the permission to bend or ignore rules in order to make the game entertaining. Some may think this strange, but for many following the rules is seen as being true to the game or author, so explicitly being given permission to do that in order to make a solo game fun is necessary for those people. Solo gaming is, after all, "all about story." (p.10)

How do you make solo play interesting? This is the meat of the book. It is not full of oracles / random tables to help you along. Instead, they lay out the approach to setting up the scaffolding for a good story. Going against how the majority of RPG rulebooks are laid out, they say to start with the setting and hook over character development. Many of the tips are ingenious in their simplicity, such as:

-Setting a rule for when to cut a scene after 1d6 actions, which helps keep the story moving along and keeps scenes from stagnating -How to avoid using dice when just picturing yourself in the scene could give you the answer. -Don't start with character creation, but build the setting first, so that you're setting the stage for the story. What's the history of the place? You don't need it all, just the big picture or most relevant/interesting, of course. -"[A]llow random table results to be interpreted as thematic results, not just literal ones." This helps to create a story with an arc and richness, rather than a cluster of random events and places. -Use non-gaming books, such as novels to generate ideas by randomly flipping to a page or rolling dice to determine the page number, then read from the page to find the ideas you need.

The book goes on to provide several other ways to come up with ideas to push the story forward and avoid the common dead ends that players often experience in solo games by using basic oracle tables. One of my favorites is creating your own random tables, and making them nested to provide more emotional or evocative places. Even the table titles can be made to be evocative: not "Wandering monsters" but "Escapees from the wizard's laboratory".

Needless to say, there is much more detail and guidance in the book to make you realize that solo rpging can be a narrative puzzle that can keep you engaged for hours. To help you along, the author includes a how-to-start-your-first-session checklist, as well as a recommended reading list that in many ways is for fiction writers or movie script writers. Then again, isn't that what we are doing in our minds -- creating a movie?

I give this 5 stars because it definitely succeeded in its goals, introduced me to new ideas and approaches, and it is a book I will be returning to reread on a regular basis as I sharpen my solo-roleplaying skills.