Brag post: Ghost Stories board game on Ipad

Black Friday discounts for Ipad apps: Pandemic and Fighting Fantasy gamebooks

Just a heads up for any who might be interested:

Pandemic, a cooperative board game that you can play solo (by controlling all four players) is discounted on the Appstore for Ipad.

http://appshopper.com/games/pandemic-the-board-game


There are also various Fighting Fantasy gamebook implementations for the Ipad which are marked down from $5.99 to $1.99. They're pretty awesome implementations as they include music that fits the mood, and some other options.

http://appshopper.com/games/gamebook-adventures-1-an-assassin-in-orlandes

http://appshopper.com/search/?search=gamebooks

Happy Thanksgiving all!

Ordinary World Chart - Stage Directives & Archetype Functions

As I've mentioned a bazillion times, I've been tinkering for a long time with the monomyth structure as a way to solo play. In the past, I posted a list of questions and items for the archetypes and stages of the monomyth. They've been somewhat useful, but I want something that's a bit easier to use as a reference, so I've created a little table to help me with the stages.

How often do you engage a randomizer for story needs?

It seems to me that for one to engage in solo roleplaying some sort of random input is needed to direct one's imagination. Without it, the exercise becomes plain creative writing, or storytelling.

Still, engaging a randomizer results in a break in the flow of imagination as you interpret the results. The break in the flow might be short, but it is there. I've found that trying to keep a cohesive feeling to the story sometimes means that the breaks are longer as I try to make sense of some random result in context of what has happened in the story prior to that.

What is your sweet spot in terms of percentages? Do you have any rules of thumb as to when to call upon Randomness?

In your solo roleplaying, how often do you engage your randomizer for story needs?
	Around 10% of the time
	Around 20% of the time
	Around 30% of the time
	Around 40% of the time
	Around 50% of the time
	Around 60% of the time
	Around 70% of the time
	Around 80% of the time
	Around 90% of the time
	More than 90% of the time
pollcode.com free polls

Hidden Information, Spontaneous Information and the solo RPG experience

I often make pretty random posts which are more like a way of trying to synthesize things I'm thinking about, or reading about, in my quest for a satisfying solo RPG experience. 

A discussion at the Story Games forum regarding games with "Hidden Information" got me thinking about the opposite concept (spontaneous information/non-existent information) and their relationship to each other. Of course, I'm also interested in their relationship to solo gaming, though I didn't focus specifically on that aspect while participating in that discussion. Here is my attempt to apply some of what I got out of that to solo rpg'ing.

Story structures: template vs map approach?

Just thought I'd share this here, as it was part of a 9Q's discussion on the Mythic GM Yahoo group. One of the members had expressed a reluctance to try the 9Q's because it seemed to him the stories always followed the same formulaic pattern.

I thought it was an interesting observation, though I don't necessarily agree with it. It made me think of the advice Christopher Vogler gives in his book about not thinking of the Monomyth as a step by step guide (if I remember correctly). Advice which I didn't really 'get' as much as I thought, until I saw the results of going against it for myself in my own tinkering with this structure as a gaming aid. 

Anyway, much of my thoughts are in my reply to the fellow member, in the rest of this post. I hope these help.