Con Game Opportunities

One of the benefits of attending a game convention is the chance to play games one otherwise does not have the opportunity to play. Toward that end, I spent a good part of the first day of Gen Con trying out a few of the so-called “indie” RPGs. At the Forge / IPR booth, I benefited from a demonstration of Thou Art But A Warrior by the designer, Anna Kreider. This game is actually an alternative setting for Polaris , where instead of the default high-fantasy background, players take on the role of Muslim knights in the Moorish kingdom of Spain. Two things were striking about this experience. First, when a scene in the game is focused on one player’s primary character, the mechanics of the game dictate which players represent which specific supporting characters. But because the roles are determined by position at the gaming table, it’s quite possible that a player will be opposed by a rival character in one scene, only to be responsible for playing that ...