Casting Shadows

Arrayed in the pull-down menus at the top of the page is a collection of commentary and comments about roleplaying games and techniques for both players and adjudicators. The focus is strictly on face-to-face and play-by-post ‘tabletop’ gaming. I have been active in these forms of interactive storytelling since 1983, and from time to time I have something to say about their workings. I hope those that read what is contained herein will have something to say as well.

Let me know if my posts contribute in any way to your games. If you like, you can also find Casting Shadows on Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook. Casting Shadows is also a podcast.

Regular Features:

1. Saturday Seeds – These were weekly plot or story ideas for various game systems. They were posted once a week… guess which day. Some were just the seed, others sprouted a little into Infectious Plots. An offshoot of this evolved into Serial Settings which were weekly posts devoted to an ongoing setting development project. These posts were made every Monday.  You can find them all in sub-menus of the Infectious Plots pull-down at the top of the page. Saturday Seeds went on hiatus after 200 seeds were posted. Serial Settings went on hiatus after two complete settings were created:
   1. The Lysette Isles – An island portal to a lost world in 1938
   2. A Korean village during the Japanese Occupation
2. Commentary – These are posts with my thoughts on how to prepare for and run games. You can find them in pretty much each category, but primarily in the Blog sub-menu in the About menu, and in the Casting the Shadows menu at the top of the page. The current one will have its title smeared across the top of the page in large script and have a picture. It will be relatively hard to miss. An additional vector for commentary are the YouTube video entries which will touch on more conversational or discussion-based aspects of these topics.
3. Live Reports – These are continuing transcripts of the games I am currently running in either PBeM or Chat-based media. For example, the site hosts transcripts from a Trinity Series (WW), a long-running Palladium Fantasy Campaign, a Mechwarrior: A Time of War Campaign, SLA Industries, Aces & Eights, Mythras, and more. You can find them in the Live Game Reports menu at the top of the page…obviously.
4. Technical Questions – These are of two types and appear on an unscheduled basis. The first type has entries that pose questions for game masters, asking them to think about and share how they would deal with a specific situation in a game they were running. The second type poses questions for players, asking them to share how they would react to a given situation. You can find them in the Technical Questions menu at the top of the page. Each type has its own sub-menu.
5. Fiction – Very rarely, I will post fiction inspired by or in support of the games we play. You’ll have to look for it, as its primary purpose will be to bolster a post on something else. There is a fiction sub-menu, but I cannot promise to link each incidence of fiction to it.
6. Battletech Lunchtime Challenge – Celebrating the release of the 25th Anniversary Edition of the Introductory Box Set, I will post a scenario and either accept or host challengers to run through it on YouTube. The intent is to spark discussions of tactics, incorporating roleplay elements in the wargame and tactical gaming elements in the roleplaying game, and to get a little bit of die-rolling fun squeezed into a lunch hour. Past challenges can be found in the Live Game Reports pull down menu at the top of the page.

Casting Shadows was a founding member of the Axis of Ogres with The Rhetorical Gamer and KORPG. What did that mean? Read our blogs and find out.

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