And now its Tim Shorts turn for an interview.
1. How
did you get your start roleplaying? What system did you use?
In the winter of '79 we were off of
school for a couple of days, my neighbor/good friend, Dwayne, called me to come
on over to play a game. I ran through the three feet of snow to see what
he had. He had B2 Keep on the Borderlands. He told me it was a game
where you kill monsters and collect treasure. "Great, where's the
board?" I asked. This game sounded cool. "There is no
board." So he and I hashed out as much as we could of the
game. And since we had no dice or any real rules to go by we made up our
own system on the spot. Since the Yahtzee and Monopoly only had 6-sided
dice to steal. Armed with 6-siders we developed a simple rule
system. A 1 is a kill. A 6 is a wound. Two wounds and you are
dead. We played for hours. Tweaking it along the way, allowing
'followers' as we called them then, to take on some of the monsters and allow
us to get farther into the caves. We had a blast.
2. Tell
me about the Gothridge Manor Blog.
Gothridge Manor is strictly about
fun. What I find fun in gaming and what's going on with me and other
folks. You won't find any edition war talk, no political bullshit or
social warrior causes. My blog is my hammock in the backyard, the place I
go to to relax, sip some ice tea and talk about something I really enjoy.
3. You
publish an awesome zine called the "Manor". It’s available in
print and electronically. What kind of stuff can a new reader look
forward to?
The Manor is a mish-mash of whatever is
going on in my head and what some of my on-line friends send me. The
majority of what I write is system neutral. You'll find your standard
fare of random tables, adventures, new monsters and magic items. In my
first issue, in the introduction I set the tone of the zine. I had six
points, but the last point I made I think is the most relevant. "I
do this for fun, not to change minds or challenge gaming philosophies. I
roll dice, laugh and try to make my funny voices sound convincing."
4. What
was the first adventure you published?
I published Knowledge Illuminates in
February of 2011 I believe. In PDF format on RPGNow. It was an
adventure I created years before as a start-up for a GURPS campaign. I
had my good friend Rob Conley redo the maps for me, to give it a more
professional feel. And switching the stats from GURPS to Swords &
Wizardry was easy. A few years later I had asked Dylan Hartwell do the
art for a print version of Knowledge Illuminates.
5. You
are doing a patreon with micro adventures, how is that going?
Micro-adventures is going exceptionally
well. I love coming up with these small settings or situations that can
be throw into a game. I've gotten a lot of great feedback from folks
who've used them. What I also like about doing the micro-adventures is it
forces me to keep going. To push beyond my comfort zone and try different
things. Recently I did a sci-fi one and I have a three part adventure
that deals with the fey realm. I probably wouldn't have ever written them
if it hadn't been for Patreon.
6. What
is your favourite OSR clone?
Swords & Wizardry Complete is my
favorite. But you can't go wrong with any of them. Castles &Crusades is what brought me back to d20 and since then I think I have tried
them all. But if I was going to run a game today S&W Complete would
me the one I use.
7. What
are you currently playing?
I've been playing a lot of different
systems lately. I just finished an Exoterrorist game and now we are two
weeks into a Pit & Perils adventure. This past weekend I ran a DragonAge game and the same group is going to give the generic version of the AGE system a try, Fantasy Age. And once in a blue moon when I play with the
b-team we were playing S&W Complete, but tried Far and Away Land last time
we got together. So a lot.
8.
Starter adventures is awesome. Where did you get the idea?
Starter Adventures was an idea that
came to me after a night of gaming with my wife, she got her own blog The HappyWhisk. Many of the 1st level adventures were toward beginning characters,
not beginning players. I thought having one-on-one adventures, that would
help someone learn which dice are which and how the basic mechanics work in
simple, short situations would be a great way to learn. And being its
one-on-one there is no pressure, so the player and GM can take their time to
explain things or ask questions.
9. You
seem to be a big fan of Mythboard, I haven't quite wrapped my head around it
yet, what is it?
Mythoard is a subscription based
service that seems permeate our culture these days. There are so many out
there these days. But Mythoard targets RPGs. So each month Mythoardships a box of random RPG products to your mailbox. I love getting fun
stuff in the mail. I even had the privilege of being Mythoard's first
exclusive, The Stone Fields of Azoroth. What I like about Mythoard is
getting the products I'd never heard of before. I get to sample products
I probably wouldn't have known about otherwise. And that's what makes it
so cool.
10. What
is your favourite published module other than yours?
Oh boy. This is tough because I
like so many adventures for so many reasons. Zzarchov and Simon Forester
put out great adventures. One of my favorite Pathfinder adventure path
is Kingmaker. I honestly can't say I have a favorite. But the
adventure I most prefer are the smaller ones, like your Abandon Mines.
Short, but fun adventures that can have prolonged effects on the larger
campaign.
11. If
you could campaign in any world which would it be?
I've been reading a ton of Dragon Age
lately. I enjoy the video games and really like what I've read so as of
now, probably a Dragon Age would be my choice.
12. What
are the plans for the future of GM Games?
Completing one or two Manor before the
end of the year. I need to finish a couple of bigger projects, doing a
Manor compilation of the first five issues and some longer adventures.
Plus, I'm hoping to recruit a few other writers for some other projects.
13. When
you get a chance to play a character, what type of PC's do you like to play?
I prefer to play PCs that are alive,
but with my penchant for rolling 1s that is rarely the case. I like to play
good guys who in the end do the right thing, but has no problem busting knee
caps along the way. And I do like to play a...not so nice guy, but I
guess I play them too well so the group has banned me from playing the not so
nice guys.
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