Tag: briebeau on design

Rusted Swords & Nice Boys: Gender in Sleepaway

Today’s post is by me, Beau, and my husband and business partner, John W. Sheldon. We’re discussing the game Sleepaway by Jay Dragon, and the experiences we had during character creation with the gender options.

All photos in this post are by John W. Sheldon, copyright 2019. I hope you enjoy it!

Beau, on Nice Boys

It is no secret that exploring gender in roleplaying games is kind of a thing I do, This is part of how I got the courage to come out as nonbinary masculine, it’s part of how I discovered I was queer and what kind of queer I am, and it’s helped me develop my perception of self.

That’s not always been easy, though. In the heyday of online text-based roleplay, I could be whatever gender I want – and in Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings fandoms, androgynous characters weren’t as often rejected as they were in other spaces. When I moved to playing face-to-face tabletop RPGs, I do think I encountered some friction with me playing masculine characters or what I now understand were nonbinary (I didn’t have the word at the time), it wasn’t much more than I got for playing pretty or sexy characters or queer characters. But, none of it ever felt… right?

A small pink-topped mushroom beside a rock.

In most of my own designs, I’ve tried to let people write in their own genders, not be restricted by the words and definitions other people are giving them and use to control and oppress them. I mean, it’s not like being “genderfluid nonbinary masculine” like me is actually a thing to anyone else, either, but it’s the closest I’ve got (though I do use “nonbinary boy” as a shortcut these days). But, this isn’t perfect – sometimes people won’t explore without a little help, a little guidance, something to escort them along their way.

When Dream Askew originally was released, I heard about the alternate gender options, and I was so excited! But when I tried to play the game, it was like a square block in a triangle hole – nothing fit, and it was sharply clear. I couldn’t make sense of it – even if I could kind of conceive the genders in my head, I couldn’t make myself want to play those characters.

But when I tried to play [Dream Askew], it was like a square block in a triangle hole – nothing fit, and it was sharply clear. …Enter Sleepaway.

-Beau

Enter Sleepaway by Jay Dragon. This game has been in my to-play for a bit, and my game group – made up of myself (gendered as noted above), my husband John (agender, presents mostly masculine), and my two cis men friends Ed and TJ who are varying levels of into exploring gender and sexuality (no judgement! some of us are just comfortable where we are!). TJ is the one who actually brought the game to the table and is facilitating.

A character sheet and name plate from the game Sleepaway.

The setup is fun in general – I honestly need to make a strong note to Jay that the writing is just phenomenal, evocative, and powerful in this game. I did a lot of summer camps as a kid, both as camper and counselor, and had some very important and scary experiences while there. The game captures all of it so beautifully and richly that I feel like I could play it a thousand times and have a unique experience every time, and learn something new about myself and my characters each time, as well. It’s also respectful in regards to First Nations and indigenous people’s rights, specifically in how you name your camp and respect the land!

And that comes into the character creation with the gender options, and where this post came from. I was skimming over them originally, until I reached The Lifeguard playbook. The top option for gender is “Nice Boy.” Anyone who knows me knows that my primary character type is something approximate to the “himbo” – a hot masculine person who is considered to be not the smartest, but is generally nice and well-intentioned even if it doesn’t always work out. I like nice boys, and specifically the gender of “boy” (not meaning a child) is one I identify with. The more I read the specific list, the more I was hooked. I knew what it meant to be a Lighthouse in the Darkness, or to be Relatable. I felt so seen by these options – and I could see other people I know in it too.

A screenshot of text saying "Describe Your Gender:" with the options "Nice Boy, Wonder Woman, A Savior and a Saint, Eagle, Castle, Lighthouse in the Darkness, and Relatable."
The Lifeguard gender options.

During and after character build, the table talked extensively about the gender options, especially me and John. John rarely talks about gender – as an agender person, he’s often said it just never clicks with him! I asked him if he could write a little about his perspective, so he has below.

John, on Rusted Swords

I’ve mostly ignored gender in games. I recognize that as a supremely privileged thing to be able to do, but as a male, masculine-presenting person, nobody made it an issue for me if I didn’t make it one for myself. As an agender person, I never really had strong feelings about gender presentation in games either – I honestly never thought of gender until other people brought it up.

Playing classic games like D&D and Shadowrun growing up, gender was usually just a single letter on a character sheet, something I jotted down and almost immediately resumed ignoring. It didn’t mean anything to me, and at the time I didn’t understand that it could to anyone else. After all, it didn’t change any of the rules for my character, or restrict any of their actions. I won’t pretend that I and my play groups weren’t steeped in misogyny as a teen, but even if I put the “F” on my character sheet, I still got treated well because I was, as a player, perceived as a man.

Then I grew up a bit. I realized that, in contrast to my own experience, other people did have an internal experience of gender. Their internal gender experiences meant a lot to them, even. I struggle to apply a useful simile to the situation, but slowly realizing that I was agender was a bit like a person slowly coming to understand that they were colorblind: people were experiencing things and making a lot of decisions based on information that was absent for me.

Then I discovered a wave of independent tabletop RPGs that dared to fuck with gender. They made it something other than a binary toggle, and didn’t pretend it was necessarily tied to biological sex. Gender was queried as a way to ask about look and presentation, and there were lots of options! I was glad that other people had selections they could use to represent themselves, but I went right along basically ignoring the whole category of experience. I dutifully picked an option during character generation, usually just as a creative choice to help define the look of the character, then went on ignoring it in play as I always did.

I dutifully picked an option during character generation, usually just as a creative choice to help define the look of the character, then went on ignoring it in play as I always did.

-John

I even tried an early version of Avery Alder’s Dream Askew. Unlike the other indie titles I’d read which focused on presentation, Dream Askew gave pick lists for actual gender, but eschewed the standard selections in favor of evocative phrases. For me, this was actually a problem. With no internal experience or sense by which to judge these phrases, and no ready external indicators to associate with them, they just looked like a list of nonsense words. To me, they might as well have been an actual list of randomly-selected words. It took me out of the game and made the whole thing more difficult for me to engage with.

A picture of the character sheet showing the gender options for the Ropeskeeper, including Hermit, Sailor, Druid, Swamp Thing, Rusted Sword, A Fox, An Ancient Oak, and None of Your Business.

Then, last night, I played Sleepaway. Like Dream Askew, each character archetype has a list of options for gender, but there was something different about these. These were written with deep ties to a genre I knew. More than that: their names resonated with attitudes and behaviors I knew and recognized in myself. Instead of a list of words that meant nothing to me, I found myself using these signifiers to imagine different ways of being for these characters – they were presentation, behavior, and identity all in one. They were gender in a way I’d never understood or experienced it for myself.

I found myself using these signifiers to imagine different ways of being for these characters – they were presentation, behavior, and identity all in one. They were gender in a way I’d never understood or experienced it for myself.

-John

Is Jay Dragon a genius because they wrote “Rusted Sword” as an option for a character’s gender? Yes. I’m saying absolutely, definitely yes.

Sunset on a lake with a tree partially obscuring a starry yellow-purple sky.

—

Thank you so much John for sharing your perspective on this! I think this has been so valuable to experience for me, and I think it’s a gorgeous piece of design. You can find Sleepaway here and if all goes well, I’ll update with our adventures at Camp Why-I-Otter!

What’s in a Ring?

I have a big life thing coming up soon – specifically, my partner Thomas and I will be exchanging rings near Halloween to make our relationship “official.” While looking at rings and thinking a lot about love and relationships, I realized there’s just not a lot of support for polyamorous people who want to have a formal aspect to their relationship, and especially when you’re not religious in any way, it can be difficult to have a way to mark your relationship.

Someday Thomas and I want to have a more formal commitment ceremony, when things are more secure, but for now, we’re just gonna have a quiet exchange of rings. I decided to write a little game about love, polyamory, self love, consent, and commitment – and give people like us a ritual to mark their love, too. I tried to be inclusive – I hope it is inclusive to you! If you like it, consider picking it up at https://briebeau.itch.io/whats-in-a-ring and leaving a donation to help us pay for a celebratory dinner. 🙂

Love to all <3

An image of the full text of What's In a Ring? over a watercolor flower.
What’s in a Ring? by Brie Beau Sheldon, dedicated to Thomas Novosel.

New Game: In Other Lives!

I released a new game! In Other Lives is a game you can play by yourself, or with friends, as you tell stories about the tourists that pass you by in public!

https://briebeau.itch.io/in-other-lives

In Other Lives is a collaborative storytelling game that you play in public, using optional randomizers and creative ideas to make the tourists and other people around you into the stuff of nightmares – or daydreams, if you’re like, into that. You can play this solo, or play with a group of friends.

REQUIRED

1-2 hours

1-6 players

A public space with some repeating visitors (the “Scene”)

Randomizer (six-sided die or flip a coin) (optional)

Notepad (digital fine)

Script Change

The cover of In Other Lives showing a carriage driver in black & white with the text In Other Lives by Brie Beau Sheldon, created for We Can Make This Work Jam - Very Hungry Tourists.

Assembludo: What I’m Working On

I’ve had some recent changes in my personal life, and they’ve reflected some changes in my professional life, too! As some people know, I have multiple romantic partners (I’m polyamorous), and that I work on game stuff and play games with my partners a lot. One of my partners is Thomas Novosel, who is a brilliant artist and game designer I met through Google+ a few years back. We’re dating, and we’re also working on some super rad game stuff.

A dark haired, bearded man in glasses and an orange and blue flannel button down looks off to the distance inside an industrial styled restaurant.
Thomas Novosel, photo by Brie Beau Sheldon (c) 2019.

Thomas is in upstate New York, and he’s consulting with me on Turn’s border towns stretch goal that replaced the Mormon towns goal. This stretch goal is going to take a little longer to complete, but Thomas was part of the inspiration – I visited him in his town, on the northern US border, and realized there are a lot of stories to tell. He’s helping me get in touch with the local indigenous center (Akwesasne natives). This is hugely useful.

(P.S.: I’m still looking for a southern border consultant, preferably a person of color, from either side of the US southern border! Please use the contact page if you’re interested.)

Thomas and I have also made our own little game collective, called Assembludo (a mashup of assemblage+ludo for artistic mashup of game stuff, basically). It’s been really fun to work on so far, and we’re nearing having some projects ready to release! It’s hard figuring out how to fund projects, but in the meantime I’ve been helping Thomas get some game jam products out like The Heaven’s Prophet’s Tomb for the Pamphlet Dungeon, and he’s run his game Runaway Hirelings for me so I can get a better feel for his design sense. (Unsurprisingly, Runaway Hirelings was SUPER fun, very creative and adventurous, and plays in like 2 hours! It’s worth way more like $10!)

The Runaway Hirelings cover with a person carrying a large sack illustrated as walking along with determination.

The other new projects we’re working on are even more exciting!

The first project we’re hoping to release as a joint effort as designers is called The Magic Hour, and it’s a short adventure for general fantasy campaigns with some custom creatures. It’s set in a small town in a rural fantasy land with a variety of characters in the town, where a mystery is occurring! People in the town have been disappearing, and no one can seem to figure out what’s happening!

The description I gave to John one of the creatures is “okapi with condor wings” and I’m excited to see them realized in the game. We’re both obviously working on this while juggling our regular jobs, freelance work, and individual projects, so it’s taking a little bit of time. But, we’re making good progress, and I think it’s a cute game adventure that encourages nonviolence, explores a small town, and has a little bit of silliness baked in. We’re both capable of seriousness and spookiness, but I think that’s something really wonderful about what Thomas and I have been working on – there’s just a little lightheartedness in every bit!

Two okapi, a mother and baby, walking around in the zoo. They are horse-like creatures with shorter faces and big ears, dark brown fur all over their torsos and then zebra-like striped fur on their legs.
Two Okapi, so cute, so weird (from Wikimedia Commons).

We have a few other ideas bouncing around. Like, Thomas is working on a King Arthur and the Round Table inspired knight game, A Knight Rode at Dawn, which looks absolutely fantastic and has been fun to follow and contribute to as he needs. I’m working on Flicker, something I started writing inspired by Thomas’s art before we started dating, which is a game about hope where you burn down tiny paper houses as you, a living flame, travel the darkening world to relight the sun. I love the game a lot, and it’s reignited by Thomas’s gentle encouragement.

Our big project, which could take a long while, is Little Green Dot, which is a game about a world populated by animals that live on little islands. It’s a world touched by folk legend and there’s a lot of thinking about our actions, what they mean now, and what they’ll mean years from now to our community, our family, our party, and ourselves. Animals are sometimes bigger or smaller than they’d be in our world, but they’re also able to use leaf-swords and acorn-caps and travel to become legends in their own right.

One of my favorite things that Thomas has written in our draft notes is this, about one of the character types that I wanted to have.

The squids and the turtles children would grow together but would always be upset and miss each other and grow apart as one went towards land. The Whale saw this and kissed the squids mantles, giving them a soft membrane of water from home to follow them onto land. Allowing them to go as far as they want, with their friends, while also taking their home with them.

Thomas Novosel, draft notes for Little Green Dot, 2019

There is a section below it where he elaborated that I read as he typed, and it made me cry!

Specific Feeling: Taking a stone from the farm with you into the city. A stone that you looked at and liked. But someone put it in your hand so that you didn’t have to pick it up.

Thomas Novosel, draft notes for Little Green Dot, 2019

This is the weirdest thing about designing with Thomas. He still is quite technical and focused on mechanics, like John is. And he’s highly artistic, like John is. But Thomas is much more of a feelsy person like me! So when he wrote this, especially as a farm kid who moved to the city and no one gave me something to carry with me, just punched me in the heart forever. It was one of our first design sessions and it remains one of my favorite things I’ve ever seen a person write about something they were designing.

Low mountains on the other side of a large field with a dynamic skyscape above, lens flares scattering across the center of the frame.
We recently went to Lake Placid and had a picnic looking at nearby mountains. Few things make me miss living in rural areas more than spending time in the wilderness!

I think my work with Thomas has made me reflect on how I design a lot! Like, maybe I need to start putting myself first, and the game after. And maybe, I should not tell myself it’s stupid to think about how mechanics feel. We ignore it so often, how games feel, what they do to us emotionally when we take action or don’t, and how we feel when we roll a die or flip a card or enforce a mechanical rule. Feelings aren’t stupid. And just because we have to work at understanding them sometimes does not mean that we should dismiss them in design. Needless to say, I can’t wait to show you more from Assembludo in the future!

One last thing I wanted to mention about my work with Thomas is something he put in the Little Green Dot document. It sounds simple, but it’s really important:

The Love Contract
If this game affects our relationship negatively, or starts hurting us. We will stop working on it, because we love each other very very much. And being in love is more important than fighting over work.

Thomas Novosel, signed by Beau and Thomas both in the Little Green Dot documents.

I look at it and I think, my gosh. How many of my relationships would be less rocky around our design experiences if I’d put this in there? What if I had put in a Friendship Contract or a Respect Contract in my projects I’ve worked on? How simple of an idea is it to just stop doing something that’s hurting you, or hurting the relationships that build up the game in the first place? It smacked me right in the forehead with its sense. So I signed it!

I love all of my partners very much. And I work with them all, to varying degrees! I think what I was missing this whole time wasn’t the right person to work with, it was the right attitude to go about working with. Considering that Thomas and I, and John and I, are very aware of how fickle the game market is and how we can’t ever expect success. I think we also know how precarious relationships can be when you’re working together. Like, yikes. With that in mind, I think prioritizing love is worth it.

Beau and Thomas in front of a picturesque mountain and lake scene with branching trees behind them. Thomas is a bearded, brown haired man in a green and red flannel shirt and aviator sunglasses. Beau is a nonbinary person with blue and white short hair, wearing a blue and black shirt and aviator sunglasses. They're both smiling brightly.
Beau & Thomas at Lake Placid, by Brie Beau Sheldon (c) 2019.

Find out more about Thomas at thomas-novosel.com and find him on Twitter at @thomasanovosel. His itch.io hosts a number of his games & game materials as well (including fonts!), and is a good place to follow!

Beau’s website is currently under construction, but you can find them through briebeau.com and as @ThoughtyGames on Twitter, on Pluspora as briebeau, Pillowfort as Brie-Beau, and at briebeau.itch.io.

P.S. I go by Beau now, tho the full name is Brie Beau Sheldon. 🙂

P.P.S. – My work with John continues on Roar of Alliance – check him out on Twitter as @johnwsheldon and on Pluspora to follow his progress. He is also still my husband, thankfully. 🙂

P.P.S. I’m still with Dillon long-distance, too, and he is running some really cool games as an awesome DM, and makes some awesome creatures for his games! Keep up with him on Twitter as @Damn_It_Dillon!

Revealed in Turn

We recently posted an update about Turn’s progress, and it’s going pretty well! We may soon be closing pre-orders (which are still open here!) if all goes well with layout, and we are pushing on thru with the stretch goals. I wanted to talk a little about Turn in playtesting, and a big thing that happened recently in our longest-run playtest.

A buff colored kitten on a soft bed, with its toes in focus.
Just a picture of a cat to start us off right.

Some people may have heard me talk on Twitter about my character Beau Taggart, who is a professional hunter, the game’s Late Bloomer, a Cougar, and super gay. In his early character background during character generation, we established that Beau had turned for the first time only recently, about six months ago (as required for the Late Bloomer role). When he turned for the first time, he his truck had just been hit by a drunk driver while he was driving down a winding back road.

He got out of the car to check on the driver, but the driver was behaving aggressively, and tried to punch him. Beau knew something felt wrong, but he was scared and panicked, and responded by hitting the guy back. He didn’t know that his body had started to turn, that his super strength had grown. The hit was so hard it broke the guy’s neck, and while Beau was realizing with horror he’d killed a man, he also turned into a cougar for the first time.

Jake Peralta from Brooklyn 99 saying "Now that I have the taste for blood, I can't stop murdering!"
This gif is not an accurate representation of Beau. It’s just funny!

His animal instincts kicked in – he hid the body, and ate some of it, leaving his claw and teeth marks on it, desperately hungry in light of the force turn. In his panic, he was found by Camellia, a fellow shapeshifter (Overachiever, Bison) who helped him get back to human form, and over time, he learned better how to calm down. He didn’t tell Camellia, or anyone else, about the drunk driver, harboring his accidental crime as yet another secret.

Not many Turn characters have super tragic backstories, and this one isn’t even all that bad (sometimes people accidentally kill people, and those are small town secrets I’ve heard), but I knew there was a risk of it being an element when people played so I built a character with a high risk background to see how fast we could ramp up to exposure. It still took over a year at our slow playing pace – which is ideal. If we were playing weekly, it would happen more quickly, but it paces out well.

How did I plan this out? Well, I knew the number of exposure marks for towns and town characters, I knew the average number of scenes per session (5-8), how many of those typically risk exposure (4-7), and how many sessions each character is generally in (3-6). I knew that having a higher risk background meant that I would end up on the higher range of everything, and that Beau was starting with a generally positive reputation as a Late Bloomer.

That doesn’t mean I was ready for the exposure to hit max!

Jake Peralta from Brooklyn 99 being asked "Are you crying?" and responding "No. That's eyeball sweat."

Turn has ten marks on the exposure track for the town. You can get positive or negative marks, based on the type of interaction that causes them. You take the marks when you’ve done something that might cause someone to suspect your shifter identity – it can be behavioral, it can be physical, etc. Something like slipping up and saying you spent all night in the woods, or maybe your eyes shine oddly in a photograph.

Beau’s track grew and grew over time, including his town character (TC) tracks, which are separate. One TC of his was Diego, his best friend who knew everything but this secret. Early on in the campaign, I played Beau to slowly reveal his identity as a shifter to Diego, purposefully planning positive encounters. He managed to do so successfully, which was good, because Beau was truly in love with Diego. They later became partners, but it was still pretty quiet, because the town was relatively conservative in that regard. Their own professional hunter in love with his buddy? Beau wasn’t sure they could handle it.

Jack Nicholson saying "You can't handle the truth!"

There are three results you can get when you become fully exposed to a TC or the town itself: reviled, which is the lowest result, and results either in a toxic and risky relationship with the TC or you getting run out of town or dealing with violence; revealed, which is the middling result and means you may risk comforts, safety, or gossip but you’ll be able to stay in town; and known, which is the best result, and means you’re accepted in the town or by the TC.

With Diego, Beau got known, so he was able to get together with Diego, stay friends and more, and not have any risk increased from it. Over time Beau had some more positive and some more negative interactions with people in the town, just like you do – simple things that cause conflict last longer in people’s minds than we thing. It was pretty balanced. But, rumors arose when a body was found in the woods that it turned out matched the drunk driver, whose car was found, too.

This combined with Beau acting out of sorts because he found out who his birth mother was and it led to a spectacular new ability – the ability to turn into a Raven, as well! These events combined led to an exposure roll, which is 2d6 plus the exposure track, added up based on the +’s and -‘s on the track, and a + for any known TCs. I rolled poorly, but had enough based on the roll, the track, and Diego, I got the middling result – revealed. That meant no immediate danger, but it meant time had come to face facts.

Griffin McElroy saying "And let's just have a full blown panic attack together!"

The rumors spread faster than Beau could do anything for, and before he could even come clean to his closest friends (Camellia and Iris, his cousin and coworker), the cops were at Camellia’s door looking for Beau. He managed to tell Diego what happened, and Diego supported him, but he was going to have to deal with the police at some point. He decided to turn himself in. Meanwhile, on the in-fiction Facebook, his fellow townspeople were spreading memes of the Cougar Killer, claiming he’d murdered the man and mutilated the bodies. This is something that would eventually die out without the police arresting him, but in the moment it was challenging!

A little bit of coordination led to him having enough time to sneak past the deputy posted at Camellia’s (where his truck was*) to tell Camellia and Iris what was going on, then turn himself in with some legal support obtained by Camellia. He confessed to fighting with the guy, but stopped short of admitting to murder. The cops didn’t have enough evidence to keep him. In the end, Beau will still live in Cauldron Springs, unable to leave easily because of the ties that hold him there, and hopefully happy with Diego (because that cat’s outta the bag).

a Cougar, by Cecilia Ferri
This cat, specifically. a Cougar, by Cecilia Ferri

But, once you’re brought in for something this serious, it’s hard for people to drop their suspicions. Combining it with Beau becoming obviously out as queer since Diego went with him to the police station, Beau’s once stellar social standing is pretty decreased. He’ll be able to survive, but he’s not who he once was to these townspeople – many of them will go on believing he actually murdered someone, others will simply struggle with his identity especially when tied with the stigma of being questioned for murder.

So basically it all worked out? Like this is exactly how this sort of result should be narratively. Maybe some people might choose to have the shifter identity be the forefront and have it be more fantastical, some people might want to diminish the fantasy even further, and either is okay – just keeping in mind that people rarely want to believe the most fantastical things, even though they’ll often use fantastical things as metaphor or illusion for the reality.

The pacing for the exposure to max out worked perfectly, the narrative surrounding it hit all the right notes, and all I did was start with some trouble baked in, like so many characters do. It meant a lot to me to play this character** and have it play out so true to what I designed. The game works, it works really good, and it tells the stories I want to be told.

I can’t ask for more, honestly.

I’m curious, what have you worked on in games that you played out in playtesting or just when you released the game that made you have that, like, damn, I did it! moment? A moment with the math lining up just right, or the narrative tone hitting the right button? Share it in the comments, and please share this on social media to talk about those moments of design success!

*Beau constantly forgot his truck at Camellia’s, where he often went to have tea to calm down and to hang out, then turned into a cougar to hit the woods. It actually became a feature on the map! Oops.

**Who some might have guessed was a test run for my chosen name

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Five or So Questions on The Playmaker Awards

Hi all! Today I have an interview with Richard Williams, who hosts The Playmaker Awards and is running a Kickstarter focused on them! This sounds like a fascinating initiative and I hope you’ll all check out the interview below and the awards themselves!

—

A pair of cards thanking Sean Nittner for his work at Big Bad Con with a Thank You note from Sean.
This is so cute!

Tell me a little about The Playmaker Awards. What excites you about them?

The Playmakers are a set of awards not for great rpg designers, game-runners or even players, but rather for the people who work hard doing the admin and scudwork creating spaces for others to play roleplaying games.

So this might be someone who runs a convention, or the rpg track at a convention, someone who keeps a local meetup or open gaming group going. It could be in-person or online. Or it could be an entirely different way of creating space for others unique to them.

I think we often under-value and underestimate the time and labour that goes into these roles. Or just don’t think much of it at all. When I’m heading to an rpg event I’m going there to game and that’s where my focus is, and of course I’m aware that people organised stuff so that there’d be a room and table and chairs and other players, but I don’t see that effort. I just have the end-result presented to me so I can game and enjoy myself.

But I don’t think that any of these playmakers do it for the recognition; I expect most of them consider it a sign that they’re doing a good job if the public don’t see all the effort behind the scenes – that they have as seamless and smooth as an experience as possible. But that just makes it more important that these playmakers do get recognised by others, because they’re not going to put themselves forward and yet their effort is so critical to the hobby. I played my first game at a local convention. I rely on them, both to play new games and to keep in touch with people who I only otherwise see online. What would this hobby be without them? A shadow of what it is, to be certain.

As to what excites me about the Playmaker awards: every stage of it so far. When I asked for nominations I was fascinated to see who would be put forward. When I contacted people to tell them they had won, some of them were bemused to win an award they’d never heard of, but some others – I don’t know – I think it might just have come at a time when they really needed that kind of appreciation. Announcing them was exciting as well, to see word spread. And now I’m into interviewing some of them for the Playmaker zine kickstarter, which really is a privilege for me; these folk spend so much time working for others in the hobby already, it’s very generous of them to spend more time so I can find out more about what they do and why they do it.

How are you determining who fits the category to be nominated or win?

I tried to describe as best I could the folk I wanted nominated and then I’ve trusted the people who took the time to reply to one of my posts with a nomination. My basic criteria was whether someone created space for others to play. I specifically excluded rpg design-work – I think we have a variety of different ways already of recognising great designers – and game-runners (such as DMs/GMs) and players as they are the ones who get to sit down and play.

In my mind, the most obvious candidates are con organisers – the many folk who I’ve seen standing behind a desk or walking through the con who’ve given up their weekend (and I don’t know how many hours before) so that _other people_ can play. However, I also wanted the awards to go further. I don’t know what play spaces are out there today, nor what’s involved in organising them, and so keeping the nominations more open was another means of discovery.

What is the judging process like and how do you decide winners?

I knew I definitely wasn’t the person to judge or rank the level of contribution made by each nominee. And what would the benefit be of saying that this playmaker who runs the rpg track of a massive convention is more or less deserving than this other playmaker who has been running a small rpg club all by themselves for twenty years? What criteria would make sense to use? What other factors would you consider? If I’m not the right person to judge, who is?

I saw the judging process as a big minefield and ultimately antithetical to my overall goal of both recognising their efforts and building a network of goodwill in this time of separation and fragmentation. So, in essence, I pushed the judging process to the nominators as well. If someone else thought you met the criteria and thought enough of you to nominate you then – assuming I could contact you and you were the person broadly doing what you were being nominated for – then you were a playmaker in my book.

The final judge I should mention was the playmaker themselves. My first question for all of the winners was whether they accepted (and, in fact, one of them didn’t). I wanted to make sure that everyone was comfortable, both the people nominating and the people being nominated.

And I feel trusting folk and being led by their nominations worked. While I did go back to a few nominators to get more details on their nomination, I haven’t rejected anyone for being outside of the scope of the awards and I’ve included a bunch of playmakers who I perhaps wouldn’t have heard of if I had been more restrictive.

A card thanking the Gauntlet with quotes from their supporters.

What do you think the benefit is of an awards process for playmakers?

I think it’s different for the individual and the hobby as a whole.

For the hobby, I feel that awards help define its values. I previously did annual awards for the London Indie RPG meetup and I had an award for most played game but also one for most played designer because I didn’t want someone to miss out because they’d produced a batch of fun games rather than a single one.  I also had an award for most popular game runner, partly as a thank you but also to encourage others to run games as well. Finally, I included special awards that were at my discetion and went to anyone who’d brought something a bit special to the group during the year such as coming in costume or fulfilling a vow to run a certain game for someone. I think it showed that we as a group valued those who brought that little extra joy to our lives.

Similarly with the Playmakers, by having such an award and by having others support and endorse it shows that creating space for others to play is a service that we value and appreciate. Just as certain holidays remind us to thank significant people in our lives and events like GMs Day remind us to thank those who run our games, so too the Playmakers reminds us and gives us the opportunity to thank these folk as well.

As to what benefit there is to the individual? To be honest, from the beginning I knew I couldn’t provide much. I did want to give each of the Playmakers something more than just a ‘thank you’ and a blogpost, something to make the award a little more substantial, to show my own sense of gratitude and so I settled on a $20 DriveThru voucher figuring that, as the Playmakers spend so much time for others enjoyment that it’d be nice for them to buy something for themselves. At a friend’s recommendation I reached out to OneBookShelf (who are the people behind DriveThru) and they very generously agreed to sponsor 25% of the total, so I put in $15 and they made it up to $20. I knew that, depending on the response rate, by advertising the voucher while nominations were open I was essentially writing a blank cheque, but the awards were not so popular as to put me in financial difficulty!

I was fully prepared that when I started reaching out to the winners that the general response from them would be ‘Errr… thanks, I guess… who are you again?’ (and I did get that a couple of times!) But actually it was far better than I expected. Most of these folk who are so generous with their time working for other people were equally generous with me, and interested to see who else were receiving awards.

And in a few cases, just winning the award struck something deeper. I don’t know what stage each of them are in the hobby or in their lives, but I do know from my personal experience that there are harder moments. Times when I reevaluate whether my time and effort is actually benefitting anyone else or even noticed. I think in maybe a couple of cases this award has come through at one of those more reflective times and been all the more appreciated because of it.

In all, I think in some cases the best thing that has come out of it for the winner is the nomination. When I asked for nominations I didn’t really expect anything more than ‘Person A for doing Thing B’, but some of the nominations are far more detailed and far more thoughtful. And I think it’s this personal message from someone a playmaker has helped can be the greatest benefit.

Recognition cards for Réka Korcsmáros about her online RPG community and including a thank you from her.

How would you encourage playmakers to act and what would you encourage them to do to make them a more likely candidate for the awards?

Just to keep doing what they’re doing! If they’re still enjoying it then keep at it, or change it up or take a break if it’s just become a labour.

I don’t intend the awards to change anything about what the winners do, rather I’m really hoping that it will inspire others to do the same. I did originally think that the awards would end with simply announcing the winners, but further it progressed the more I realised that this would be a disservice to the concept. The nominations have been great but they’re only a tiny glimpse of the Playmakers’ stories.

To that end, as part of Kickstarter’s ZineQuest initiative in February, I’ll be crowdfunding a collection of new interviews some of the Playmakers, getting into more detail about what they do, why they do it and what they need to do it better.

It’s been great to give these folks an award and a thank you, but it has been so much more interesting to dig deeper. I hope that the final product will be a unique perspective on the state of public rpg play today and that hearing their stories will inspire others to do the same.

—

Thank you so much to Richard for the interview! I hope you all enjoyed reading it and that you’ll check out The Playmaker Awards and the Kickstarter!

Thoughty is supported by the community at ko-fi.com/Thoughty. To be featured on Thoughty, check out the contact page!

Script Change Changes, Reflection

Hi y’all!

I recently made updates to Script Change (itchio) and wanted to break them down a little! You’re going to get some of my recent photography with it, also, because I wanna.

All photos by Brie Beau Sheldon (c) 2018-2019.

Whatcha got for me? Charlie is ready to go!

Sorting it out

Some of this was just some reorganization – I wrote this document originally starting like 2012-2013 and it went through some shuffles over that time, and some organization for clarity and approachableness was vital. Now there’s a more smooth flow, and the layout is tidied a little bit, too. I also added what I think is an awesome table handout with brief explanations of the tools, with larger text so it’s more accessible! There are ways I can expand this, but I gotta take my time sometimes.

Figuring it out

I needed to ask what Script Change was doing in regards to addressing different needs at the table. One of the recent discussions about the topic of safety tools was the Luxton Technique, discussed on Google+ (I’m asking the author of that post if they’d like to duplicate it here, since G+ is dying, but that’s where it is now), which addressed the ability to not pretend something didn’t happen, to give more narrative control, and to change the way we approach when content comes up in game that we don’t want to have ruin our play experience.

One way I wanted to address this was ensuring that it was clear you discuss potential triggers, squicks, etc. up front. Since Script Change approaches this with a “control all content, even without triggers” focus I tried to frame the initial discussion as choosing the rating, then addressing categoric avoidance, noting that they should be recorded but do so without listing player names (because for me, personally, being the person with a giant list of don’t-wants is actually really upsetting and makes me less comfortable sharing).

I am considering further expansion by making a printable “triggers, squicks, and dislikes” list where people can print it out or save it (make it digitally editable) and have it separated to “do not use, fast forward if used, pause to ask if used” or something like that. This is a challenge because some of this stuff changes, but if I remind people it can be altered at any time, that should be okay. This is a “next time” piece – I wanted to get the latest update out when I did.

Next I worked on how the actual tools work. I did an expanded explanation of how each tool works, including expanding that pauses can be used for discussion, ensuring that you identify what the content is that’s an issue, and noting that you can identify subjects that frame-by-frame is always used for. This is probably the deeper game design part, so I’ll try to detail a little more later. I also, however, added a full question and response to address the issue of pretending things didn’t happen.

Every release lately has felt like I’m traveling up a steep hill, with no other side, so I gotta get done what I can.

In one q&a, I detailed how you can discuss together what it means when you rewind – is it a dream? is it a prediction of a possibility that didn’t happen? Or is it simply cut on the editing room floor? Nonetheless, I noted:

However, final rulings do reside with the person who called for the tool to be used – in some cases, people may want to just say it didn’t happen and there’s no narrative representation. If this is what is safest for them, we must respect that – just like we should respect people in different scenarios asking to have it be represented as a part of the fiction, if they are the one who called the tool.

It’s important to note that the experiences happened in real life – whether it was triggering content or just simply off tone, it wasn’t disappeared into nothingness for us in real life. Do not erase people’s experiences. Script Change is a meta-toolbox, and we must acknowledge reality regardless of the fiction.

I think my language could be refined, so I’ll be revisiting this in the kind of quarterly review I do.

A log with fungus growing on it in the sun, with a lens flare in orange and bright pink.

But My Feels

Some people have expressed a desire to educate in response to content they might use Script Change for, or even explain their trauma to others, which is a valid want. My issue with this is that I know how easy it is to trigger a friend when you vent your trauma, and also how sometimes when we’re in need of support, we ask for it in a place that can’t support it. I tried to keep my language gentle here, like I do in most of Script Change.

If you need to talk about it, you can ask for a pause to explain what’s going on, and the other players should listen. It is also good to discuss topics that come up at a Wrap Meeting. Remember to respect each other in how much you ask of each other, and keep in mind that their capacity is just as other players or possibly friends. You should all be generous to each other, and understanding of each others’ limitations.

During this discussion, if you plan to share anything potentially triggering of others’ traumas, make sure to warn people so they can be safe for themselves. If they need to excuse themselves so you can address the topic, be understanding.

Basically, I want people to have the avenue to discuss things, to speak about why they called the tool. But, I also care about protecting everyone at the table, and that includes the people who are unable to handle triggering content for their own private reasons. I know I am often willing to speak up about my triggers and trauma, but I also know I’ve hurt people in doing it. This section is to hopefully help ensure we can do one without the other.

Other Players

I’d previously addressed whether others would take tools seriously, but I expanded this section to cover something I’ve written about before – leaving the group, or finding an alternative way to engage, including using a tool other than Script Change.

If you encounter an issue where you are afraid or uncomfortable using Script Change tools with your group, it’s possible that Script Change is not the right toolbox for you. it’s also possible that the group is not right for you, and you should consider finding an alternative option. If you want to press forward with both of them, the best option is to speak plainly about your concerns. If you trust these people enough to game with them, you will hopefully find the day they respond with care to you saying “hey, I don’t feel comfortable.” If they don’t, then you have a bigger problem that needs to be approached with a longer dialogue – or by ending the dialogue.

Sometimes you gotta have rules on what you’re willing to take.

Speaking of other players, I also encouraged people to speak up for other players! This was talked about in the Luxton technique, too, and is something I have personal experience. Once, while playing a horror game, the story turned and headed into a mental hospital. I froze completely, just totally not okay with dealing with one of my worst fears. My husband John knew I was not okay both by looking at me and by our prior discussions about content, so he tagged an X-card for me. Saved me from a real rough experience! So I broke it down a little:

You can use Script Change tools on behalf of other players! If you notice your friend is acting uncomfortable and something is happening in game that might be causing it, it’s okay to use a tool to either check in with them (like a pause) or to directly address the content (like rewind or fast forward). It’s okay for you to do that and say that you feel like it might be making people uncomfortable, and not put any direct light on the person in question, or to just say you personally don’t want to see that content.

Sometimes, we step up for other people, and it makes the game a better experience!

That was important to me, honestly.

Addressing the Crunch

I personally play some games that are pretty crunchy sometimes, where it might seem like the players or even the facilitator are at the whim of the calculations. I also kind of hate that aspect of it – if a mechanical result is going to traumatize me or ruin my fun, fuck that, I want a different option. So I clarified something that I’ve been hesitant to do, but have been doing for a while: Script Change can change mechanical results. In fact, this has been core in Turn’s design since the game’s inception. Example:

In our current game of Turn, I’m playing Beau, a cougar Late-Bloomer who has struggled a lot. He’s queer, and over the course of the story, he’s had to come out to friends and family members in both shifter and queer identity, and also deal with an ailing adoptive father. His biggest upside is he’s found his true love, a guy named Diego who is also his best friend. Beau currently has one mark left on his town exposure track, meaning he could be expelled from the town or killed if the roll goes badly, because small towns are fickle with their love when it comes to being different.

I might have shared this before but every time I feel kind of sad for being weird I think of these damn pumpkins.

I updated the “don’t wants” kind of list by telling our Town Manager, John, that if Beau has to leave the town, Diego comes with him – no arguments. If I get to the roll and it’s really bad, I could back up the scene using a rewind and approach it differently, and when the roll comes again it could be different. But, at least with this, I know I have the security to get a satisfying end to my character’s story – a character who carries my chosen name, who I have played for like a year.

It may not always be what you want, and I can understand how people might fear its abuse as a toolbox function! So I wrote it in like this:

Script Change can also be used for mechanical results if the group agrees to it. There are times when one bad roll, or one potential consequence, would be enough to make a game unpleasant or even upsetting for us. So long as the group agrees to use it in this context, it’s okay to rewind a roll or fast-forward an unnecessarily long combat. It’s important to remember that when you rewind a roll, you will typically rewind to before you took the action that prompted the roll, and have to take a reasonably different action going forward. This helps to ensure fairness in play!

I personally love it! If someone’s deeply in love with crunchy games (like me with Shadowrun 3e!) or just gets super attached to characters, using Script Change and knowing it takes some thoughtfulness to use may help them have a less risky play time.

Wrapping It Up

The last BIG change was that I added a lot of detail to wrap meetings! I even offered a list of questions to help guide the meetings, encouraging a supportive environment, one where you ask questions and elaborate as you’re comfortable. It includes this section, which I think is important:

If someone is uncomfortable addressing the issue from game during the wrap meeting out loud and at that time, they should be an option to send an email, write a note, or have a later discussion to follow up to make sure that everyone is comfortable and knows what’s happening. This lets people address topics more safely and reduces repeat errors.

I realized just now there’s a duplicate later in the actual PDF, so I’ll add that to the to-fix. But, this part was important to me because sometimes we don’t process our feelings right away, or need to calm down, but still deserve to be heard. So, I’m encouraging using all the tools at our disposal to ensure wrap meetings are effective!

One final change I plan to make in the next revision for sure is changing all uses of GM to facilitator. It was irresponsible to leave it this time – I just didn’t feel like dealing with what it might do to the layout, but GM isn’t the best term. Added to the list!

So that’s that! The work I’ve done for Script Change has been extensive. I do a fair bit of reading, and a lot of thinking and writing/re-writing. The project means so much to me, and I love it a lot. Every time someone shares and recommends it on social media and tags me on like @ThoughtyGames and stuff, it makes me feel proud! I don’t feel proud a lot, so that matters. And it matters most that people are learning about some options for how to stay safer at the table, and have a more fun time. 🙂

It’s sometimes worth it to hold still for a while and see what’s underneath the surface, and watch the water turn to silk and blur. When you see the rough edges, will you try to smooth them out, or flow with them to create something beautiful?

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New Year Plans 2019

Photo credits to Brie Beau Sheldon 2018.
a pale blue coffee mug on a cofee table in front of a TV and a window, steam pouring from the top, a teabag sitting in it.

Well, y’all, I’m busy and tired.

I’m supposed to start this post with a fired up enthusiasm about all the projects I’m working on and how I’m gonna be awesome and do a great job! But today? Today I do not have that for you.

Here’s what I have for you, in the immediate.

I’m working on interviews with Epidiah Ravachol on Wolfspell and Becky Annison on Bite Me! so once those are finished up we’ll have something to howl about. I don’t actually have further interviews on the docket, but I’ll work on it. I always do.

(As a reminder, the best way to get interviews here is to encourage your favorite creators to go to my contact page and send me an email with the info! That cuts out like three emails worth of information exchange and shows me they’re excited to be interviewed. Plus, it makes sure that you – my readers – see what you want to see. You can also help me do more interviews and posts of all kinds by supporting via Patreon and sending tips via PayPal or ko-fi! Note: I don’t think I’m charging for this post, even though it took a while.)

I have some other posts in mind, like one talking in detail about the updates I’ve done to Script Change, reviews of a product or two, and so on. It would be cool to know if you have interest in anything, as a lot of the time I’m running on my own ideas here and I don’t even know if you’re enjoying the posts sometimes! With the ending of G+, this will get even harder for me to gauge. Please comment, share and tag me, and so on!

Speaking of comments, I’m looking at a move to WordPress since G+ is dying and I have no idea what will happen with comments here, plus the site has been kind of wonky. It’s gonna cost money and time, like a lot of it, so it may be a while.

On the games front, I’m currently working on a number of projects. Some of them are personal, some are professional, and all of them have unique challenges. The issue is, few are having successes, at least by my count.

A small group of red berries against a dark grey sky and branches.
First and foremost is Turn, my game I Kickstarted in October, which I’m in the production phase for. Now that the Kickstarter is done and we’re into production, aside from a few blips on the radar, all positive feedback has ceased. I’ve also had to deal with a ton of financial stuff that’s very hard for me, our beast artist had to step down so we had to replace them, and my own experience going through the editing process has been rough. Some of this was expected, some of it was not! 
This is hard! It’s also exhausting. Especially when I have to dig into my work each day and I find myself questioning all of my decisions, my ability to do my job, and my ability to make this work. 
Second, I’m working on Leading with Class. It’s not a game, but it’s about games, and we have a ton of work to do on it. We can always use more support over on Patreon to help us reach our goals, and some enthusiasm for the project would be something nice to see. I want to do more with it! Or, at least meet our base goals!
Third, I’m also working carefully or not-working-right-now on a number of other games of varying sizes:
Posers – This is currently at a halt as I can’t figure out the right form factor, which has locked up my design. It’s a game about performing masculinity, and has a weird knot-tying/untying resolution mechanic. No idea when I’ll be working on this in earnest.
At the Lake by Morning – This is a game inspired loosely by Annihilation and is supposed to use water and a mirror in the mechanics, which is going to take some fiddling. I want to explore some feelings I got from the film, significantly looking at self-forgiveness and change. It’s new.
The Unhurried Pursuit of Sloth – This I have all the ideas for, just gotta start digging into the mechanics. It won’t start in earnest until Turn’s finished. It’s a game about taking it slow and self-communion.
Laser Kittens Octopus Hack – I’ve been signed on with Glittercats Fine Amusements to write an octopus themed Laser Kittens hack, which involves the octopus being brought into a marine science lab and (perhaps!) escaping. I’m putting down the first bits of it soon. Glittercats awesomely chose to keep the lights on, so my energy can be more easily directed at this. I’m gonna do my best.
Eldrich Inkling – This is a two-player investigation game where one player sets a cosmic horror story for another, played by mail. It mostly requires research, which takes time, especially with my brain.


Tribute – I recently decided to withdraw Tribute from the Gauntlet Codex as the game is based largely in processing loss of love, and my grief (related to my grandmother’s death) won’t allow me to publish it through someone else, and won’t let me finish it until I resolve some things. It’s strong, but there is something missing. It may have to wait until spring – if it does happen at all. I hope it does.

A bird's nest nestled in trees in front of an overcast sky.

And that doesn’t touch my home projects – specifically, the be-a-better-person & be-healthier projects. Which, you know what, are just as important as my deadlines! I’m currently doing physical & speech therapy for my concussion recovery, plus diving back into psych therapy to help treat my bipolar disorder, PTSD, anxiety, and various related troubles. The PT+speech takes up a minimum of 10 hours of appointments, home work, and recovery from those appointments and home work each week – that’s not counting the normal days I have symptoms from my concussion, or dealing with insurance. With my existing disabilities on top… yeah.

Psych therapy is going slower, but is a lot of emotional work. When you go through cognitive type therapy, you can find you get stronger while simultaneously becoming more sensitive and delicate. Those aren’t words I like for myself, but there they are. I’m working on myself as much as I can, while trying to avoid the daggers that are the world – and they are such sharp daggers, and so many! I wish they were something softer.

A tightly framed picture of a fox red colored dog on a white blanket.

I guess where I’m at right now is like, yeah, 2019, lots of plans. Loads of things I have to do, things I want to do, things I’m struggling to do. And hopefully more on the way. I want to be more successful, to help provide for John and me to have a happy life. I just feel like I keep hitting setbacks, and Thoughty can be a casualty of that – it is hard to do this and do everything else and survive. You can bet your bottom I’m trying to reinvest all of this struggle and pain into games and Thoughty – just gotta filter it, refine it, and find a place for it.

I hope that you’ll stick with me as I keep making things and keep asking questions. I also hope you’ll do those things, too!

And hey, take care of yourselves. It helps me believe that I can make it when we aren’t all falling apart together! Let’s build each other up, and build a better year.

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Turn Design Stream

Hi all!

I did my first Turn Design Stream and I’d love to hear your thoughts!

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Ears Are Burning

Ears Are Burning is now on
https://briecs.itch.io/ears-are-burning

a dark blue box with the text "Ears Are Burning by Brie Beau Sheldon, a game of superstition & the public eye"

Ears Are Burning is a single-player game using timed observation and body control (low-impact meditation) to explore our connection to the constant flow of input from others, and our own output in desperation to match it, and the way it impacts us physically. It’s a simple experience, but everyone knows that when it comes to discourse, it’s always possible to lose the game.

—

Ears Are Burning is super simple but it is expressing an experience I’m struggling with as I work through running a Kickstarter. It’s not easy – in fact, it’s super challenging – to let your ears cool down. I hope I can find more time to do it soon. Won’t you join me?

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