The Only Bad Sessions

I. Dear Reader,

I think there is only one kind of session that I would call “a bad session”. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes I don’t have great sessions!

But this is usually because the table just isn’t feeling it today. Sometimes, I or my fellow players just don’t have the energy. And everyone is trying hard to make it work … but it just isn’t. This is a great problem to have because all you need to do to fix it (hopefully) is just call the session to an end early and do something else. Pretty great, all things considered.

Sure, it’s compounded when the game isn’t a good fit. But I have never had a bad session where the group is feeling great, regardless of what game we’re playing. A game can be frustrating but often, in my case, this frustration feels productive, creative. Well, for jokes, if nothing else.

The only bad sessions I ever have is when nobody passes the ball to me. This can only happen as a player. But I’ve been in games where I didn’t really get to play at all – where I didn’t feel welcomed or supported or wanted for whatever reason. Those are the only bad sessions I ever have.

So try not to do that at your tables and you’re probably having a great game! Everything else, as nobody really says, is gravy.

Yours succinctly,

Thomas

---

II. Media of the Week

• Over on Yes Indie’d, I sat down with jay dragon to celebrate the release of Yazeba’s Bed & Breakfast, which is a very real achievement as a book and a game. We breakdown the game and build it back, discussing the constituent parts: the specific characters, the chapters-as-games, and the way the characters change over time.
• I was a really big fan of the first video in this series by Games & Culture. Glad to see its picked up again.

---

• This newsletter exists because of this patreon!
• If you’ve released a new game on itch.io this month, let me know through this form so I can potentially include it in the end of the month round-up.

---

III. Links of the Week

• Most of Rascal News is behind paywalls but fun stuff happening over there all the time, including Lin Codega on how the latest d&d press conference almost deradicalized them and Chase Carter reviewing Last Train To Bremen by Caro Asercion.
• On his patreon (public), Quinns talks about two games that couldn’t fit in their video schedule: TEETH and Swyvers, both funny and dark games set in a very weird England. (I get a mention here.)
• Jim Rossignol and Marsh Davies, the creators of TEETH, write a good newsletter and in their latest issue, they talk about the lay-offs/shuttering of Dicebreaker and the state of tabletop media. (I also get a mention here.)
• Nico, co-ordinator of the Awards, does a regular analysis of the state of tabletop RPG crowdfunding. His latest piece talks about Backerkit versus Kickstarter as well as how 5e products are doing even better than usual, despite, you know, everything.
• I love Chris Chinn’s Deeper in the Game for its conscious approach to what being a GM looks like. A great example is this latest post about discovering exactly what principle underlay his decision to skip an encounter in Errant.
• I had previous shared a post called Against Design from the Nordic Larp site and now, there is a response: For Design.

Misc/Tools

• Ironsworn fans, there’s a wonderful plug-in for Obsidian called Iron Vault that turns it from note-taking software to full VTT.
• On Reddit, I also stumbled across this custom app for playing Greg Stolze’s A Dirty World.

From the archive:

• Tasha Robinson writes for Polygon about Fall of Magic and City of Winter, two beautiful games centred around a large cloth map. (Issue 35, April 2021)

---

IV. Small Ads

All links in the newsletter are completely based on my own interest. But to help support my work, this section contains sponsored links and advertisements. If you’d like your products to appear here, read the submission form.

• A cozy solo mech TTRPG from the award winning designers of SHIVER at Parable Games. Try the ION Heart QuickStart here. Boldly go beyond with your mech bestie. 🚀
• Grimwild is D&D heroic fantasy meets a fluid cinematic ruleset. Low GM prep, no mechanical slog, pointcrawl exploration, and lots of creative freedom. Back it now!

This newsletter is currently sponsored by the Bundle of Holding.

• Get the core rulebook and a bunch of adventures for Esper Genesis, a scifi take on 5th edition D&D.

---

Hello, dear readers. This newsletter is written by me, Thomas Manuel. If you’d like to support this newsletter, share it with a friend or buy one of my games from my itch store. If you’d like to say something to me, you can reply to this email or click below!