Player Skill versus Character Skill

The Award-Winning Substack Post is Now a Motion Picture!

Today at Arbiter of Worlds, we (re)direct our attention to the every-challenging problem of balancing player skill and character skill. If you’re a long-time reader of this blog, or avid fan of my games, you’ll have previously encountered my “synergistic” approach to player and character skill. Now, you can encounter it again, only this time with me making funny voices and wild gesticulations.

Late last week, I uploaded Episode 2 of my ACKS II Actual Play series, The Grey Brotherhood. 25 years ago, I ran D&D at the West Point Wargames Club for this crazy cast of characters. Now we’ve re-united online to play my new game, ACKS II. Some of these fellows haven’t gamed in a decade or more, and tragically, an NPC pays the price for the mistakes of these rusty former warriors:

If you’re a social media user, you might have enjoyed the… robust… debate on #RPG Twitter about the merits of “skimpy armor” over the weekend. If you aren’t following me on Twitter (@archon), you can find my profile here.

Warning: NSFW artwork created by our virile and red-blooded ancestors follows.

Based on the virality of these tweets, I’ve concluded two things. First, there is a large and under-served audience that enjoys RPG characters wearing “skimpy armor” a la Conan, Red Sonja, John Carter of Mars, and so on. Second, that the success of Ascendant may not have been entirely due to its elegant logarithmic math. I just can’t quite put my foot on it.

Despite the distractions of YouTube and Twitter, work continues to progress nicely on the upcoming ACKS Imperial Imprint (ACKS II), which is being re-designed to make full use of the techniques for agency-focused sandbox gaming that I describe in Arbiter of Worlds. My hope is that if you’re a GM who has found my blog or YT channel useful, you’re going to find ACKS II to be your taste. ACKS II will be crowdfunding this summer, with sneak previews on my Patreon including complete drafts for King-tier and above.

That’s all for now — Don’t forget to subscribe to the YouTube channel, then head over to the links below for others ways to get involved in my recently-declared Simulationist culture movement. If you’re already a fan, be kind and spread the word!

• Autarch Discord with the smartest, nicest gamers around

• ACKS Patreon with sneak previews of ACKS II every month

• Ascendant Patreon with a new character and story hook every month

• Autarch Facebook page with news and updates about our projects

• Autarch Twitter channel with brief comments and witty quirks

• Ascendant Comics Facebook page with sneak previews of the upcoming comics

• Ascendant Comics Instagram page with tons of art and cosplay

• Ascendant Comics Twitter channel with short messages and quirky wit

• ACKS Forums with discussion for the game

• Ascendant Forums with FAQ and Errata for the game

Thanks for reading Arbiter of Worlds!