The primer on tabletop roleplaying we needed — great for both new and experienced players and GMs and everyone in between.
Many roleplaying systems claim to support play in any kind of setting but few really do — Savage Worlds is an exception. It’s got crunchy-enough systems that are only as relevant as you want them to be.
Savage Worlds is the most “more than the sum of its parts” tabletop roleplaying system I’ve played — it rocks.
Charles, a valet robot, is let go from his job and then goes on a journey of self-discovery. Hijinks ensue.
Around 400 BCE, in Syracuse, Dumb and Dumber want to put on a play by Euripides.
They’ve got no actors, no costumes, no sets, no money and little to no intelligence. But, as they say, where there is a quarry filled with starving Athenian refugees, there’s a way.
Gene Wolfe’s take on an Alice in Wonderland “rabbit hole” story which follows an American teen who finds himself in a layered fantasy world based on Arthurian legend, British folklore, Greek mythology, Norse mythology, and more… All at the same time…
Reading through K.J. Bishop’s The Etched City was sublime. Novels like this don’t get written often and reading them leaves me a changed man. The poetry, the philosophy, the mythic and dream-like nature of the writing have left me completely stunned and in awe of its beauty and depth.
A small American town is trapped under a gigantic forcefield (the Dome). Hijinks ensue.
I tried to write a book that would keep the pedal consistently to the metal. Nan [King’s editor on Under The Dome] understood that, and whenever I weakened, she jammed her foot down on top of mine and yelled (in the margins, as editors are wont to do), ‘Faster, Steve! Faster!’
Stephen King on writing Under The Dome
An extremely efficient yet thorough guide to running tabletop RPG games. I would have loved to have read this back when I first started GMing over a decade ago! It’s got everything you need to give you the confidence to start run great games.
Even if you’ve got experience GMing, there’s so much knowledge in this book and it’s expressed so clearly that you’ll undoubtly learn a bunch reading it, no matter what kind of games you’re interesting in running.
An abstract, surreal, mythical, weird sadhouse megadungeon — a perfect fit for old school rennaissance tabletop roleplaying games, as long as you’re open for things to get a little bizarre.
A Delta Green campaign module based on the King in Yellow, where investigators start with an investigation into a missing persons case tied to the King in Yellow and get sucked into that world.
Lovecraft X The X-Files tabletop roleplaying game. Delta Green has been kicking around for decades and so it has so much modules written for it, critical for an investigative RPG like this where the devil is in the details and it’s much harder to run a game like this without any supporting material.
Metal Gear / A-Team inspired tabletop RPG. Seems like this would be great for one-shots (or potentially longer campaigns) with people with any level of experience in roleplaying because the rules are so simple yet exciting.
Becky Chambers’ space opera following the scrappy and loveable crew of the Wayfarer, tasked with their biggest job yet.
Ursula K. Le Guin’s Greco-Roman mythical retelling from 2008, way before these kinds of novels became “cool” and everyone started writing them.
Lavinia tells the story of, well, Lavinia, a character in Vergil’s Aeneid who isn’t given any speaking lines. Lavinia being such a paper thin character gives Le Guin the opportunity to fill in the many gaps. And, to no one’s surprise, she’s done a great job of it.
Ash - A Secret History is by far the longest novel I’ve read. When I saw the thickness of the book, the number of lines on each page and the miniscule size of the font, I was scared that I wouldn’t be able to read through the whole thing.
All it took for me to get over that fear was reading the first few pages. Mary Gentle hooked me with her commitment to telling Ash’s story in a way that only she could and she refused to let go of me until the very end.
Adrian Tchaikovsky strikes again. Human animal hybrids with developing consciousness. Check. Hive mind consciousnesses. Check. Empathy porn. Check.
I might enjoy Dogs of War more than Children of Time? It’s more efficient and covers many of the same themes with many more interesting characters.
The ultimate gamer Gurgeh is tired of his life in a post-scarcity society because he’s played every game there is and nothing and no one can put up a challenge. He’s given an opportunity to spice up his life, he takes it. Hijinks ensue.
I’ve played the Paranoia RPG more than a few times, it’s always a blast. If you’re into chaotic, goofy, absurdist, comically dystopian settings and cooperative/competitive roleplaying systems then you’ll love Paranoia.
What if you combined:
The Running Man-esque gladiatorial combat as entertainment with some Battle Royale with some pro wrestling theatrical vibes sprinkled on top with some Naked and Afraid and light it all up?
You get Chain-Gang All-Stars, that’s what you get.
I love the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games! Especially the third one. It’s a game I always come back to over the years.
Reading through the original inspiration for the games was a real pleasure.
This was the first romance novel I’ve read. Sometimes you have to unleash your inner mom and read a book by a mom for moms.
I’m about as far from a mom as you can get but despite that, Cesca Major pulled me in with her writing in a way that I wasn’t expecting.
A bleak but compelling investigation on a variety of world ending issues we’re facing currently.
You have to be in the right mood for this text but if you are, you’re likely to learn something.
A fantastic conclusion to the Book of the New Sun. Do not skip this one, it’s cool, it’s funny, it’s wacky, it’s begging to be read multiple times.
If you’ve got the right group, this would make for a great book club book.
A far future sci-fi fantasy epic following the story of Severian the torturer, a self-described insane person who has trouble differentiating between reality, his memories and his dreams, as he tells us the story of how he came to sit upon the throne.
It’s short and sweet (and sour) and that’s what makes this novel so special. It’s got one of the most unsettling POVs I’ve read in a while. It starts weird and only gets weirder from there.
It’s a great Halloween read. It’s got an Adams Family aesthetic (weird family in a mansion ostracized from their community) but with a less comedic tone.
Big robots,
fighting off aliens,
piloted by pairs of young men and women (mostly boys and girls), with the men draining the life force from the women (often killing them in the process).
Wu Zetian, eventually becoming the Iron Widow, is sold to the army by her family to become a concubine-pilot. She has a plan to avenge her sister, burn the system to the ground and build it back up again.
Dayummmmmm this was good.
A compelling and instructive book on the many logical fallacies we are guilty of committing ourselves and exposed to through the media and internet.
A book that made me feel as though it was written specifically for me. A must read book that very few people will read.
There’s a, soon-to-be wizard, on a archipelago world. He goes to wizard school and becomes xXx#1_Mage_NAxXx.
A classic fantasy story elevated by Le Guin’s poetic use of words. Struggles to give women in the story the story they deserve, an issue dealt with in the subsequent novels.
The shake that passes will echo. The wave that recedes will come back. The mountain that rumbles will roar.
The Fifth Season is a story about suffering and trying to find moments of pleasure and peace in a broken world.
The POV characters are all persecuted and forced to suffer because of circumstances outside of their control.
In fair puzzles there should always be a way out. But I saw no doorways in the sand, and try as I might I could not make the puzzle fall fair.
Doorways in the Sand tells the story of Fred Cassidy the “Eternal Student”, a man who’s spent 13 years of his life as an undergrad.
He does everything he can to avoid getting a degree so he can continue benefiting from his uncle’s generous will, predicated on him being in school (once he graduates he’ll be cut off).
Fred’s idyllic existence is disrupted by the theft of a priceless alien artifact, the star-stone. He’s a person of interest for reasons outside of his control and so he is pursued by humans and aliens alike who think he can help them find the stone (can he?).
“You are a living example of the absurdity of things.”
Hijinks ensue.
Thud! by Terry Pratchett tells the story of Sam Vimes, head of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch, and his fellow coppers trying to solve a dwarf’s murder. The upcoming anniversary of the thousands years old Battle of Koom Valley is keeping tension high between the dwarves and the trolls; making it harder for the constables of the Watch to keep the peace and solve the crime.
Thud! is a Terry Pratchett novel through and through. There’s ample comedy interlaced with impactful action scenes with just a little bit of drama sprinkled in. This time around, it’s a little grittier and darker than usual.
Going Postal is my favorite Terry Pratchett novel. I’m facepalming right now for not writing my thoughts down about this book.
Cassandra in Reverse is a novel about a woman in her early 30s with a fascination for Greek mythology who has just been dumped by her boyfriend of 4 months and fired from her job in PR.
In that moment, something snaps and she gains the ability to go back in time. She becomes like her namesake from myth who could see into the future but was cursed to never be believed.
I guess this is what happens when a tremendously successful author with a single published novel to her name spends 16 years writing another one.
I read Susanna Clarke’s first novel, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel, as a kid and, now, I’ve forgotten what it was about and if I enjoyed it (or not).
After reading Piranesi, I’m unlikely to forget this one and how I felt reading through it.
A very human story with Alien aliens, AI/human constructs and time “travel”.
The first Adrian Tchaikovsky story I read and perhaps the best. Once you pick this book up, you won’t be putting it back down until it’s done.
A philosophical exploration of what it means to be awesome and not suck, and a plea for more awesomeness in our personal, social, and public lives.
Media Literacy teaches you how to navigate through the overwhelming flood of information found in today’s media-saturated world. Drawing from thousands of media research studies, author W. James Potter explores key components to understanding the fascinating world of mass media. Potter presents examples and facts to help you understand how the media operate, how they attract attention, and how they influence you and the public.
Elie Wiesel’s Night is a retelling of what happened to him during World War 2; in a Nazi death camp, he witnesses the death of his family, the death of his innocence and the death of his God. Night shows you evil at its peak and convinces you that this horror must never be allowed to happen again.
Infrastructure is a guide to all the major “ecosystems” of our modern industrial world. In exploring railroad tracks, antenna towers, highway overpasses, power lines, coal mines, nuclear power plants, grain elevators, oil refineries, steel mills, and more, Brian Hayes reveals how our familiar and often-overlooked industrial environment can be as dazzling as nature.
Understanding Power is the book that convinced me that I needed to start reading again. It’s just a bunch of transcripts taken from Noam Chomsky Q/A sessions, but man, I’m glad that I was convinced to sit down and read through it.
A tabletop roleplaying system where everyone tries to one-up each other with increasingly ridiculous stories about their adventures and exploits in their roles as Georgian/Victorian era noble people.
Makes for a great one-shot with the right group.
