Thursday, October 17, 2013

Visual Random Encounters

I printed these out and taped them into my DM notebook...


Some pictures are worth at least a paragraph.

Like I wouldn't have put this picture in one of these here:
Nice as it is, it doesn't do much more work than the entry on the random encounter chart I already have that says "Manticore", whereas #19 above says "Creepy pseudo-asian potentate half-finished with some blasphemous sacrifice with a bunch of decapitations behind him" and it says it in half a second. Handy when you're trying to whip something up in the middle of a session.

Plus, with a lot of the more exotic concepts--like #14--words break down and the monster is fuck-all without the picture, so it's nice to be able to go "You see...this"
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6 comments:

Tedankhamen said...

Zak,
I love your art and imagination, but I wonder what do you see in D&D? It is almost like you've gone past needing the rules or stats and are consciousness streaming it.

Someone once told me about poetry that I should try writing forms and not my usual free verse because it is like wearing pedal grips on a bicycle going down hill - it lets you perfect form as you get used to speed. Is it something like that? Do you ever feel constrained by rulebooks and editions and the weight of all that came before? Or is it all just grist for the creative mill?

Anonymous said...

This is a great idea!

Do you know what model # 10 on the first picture is?

Zak Sabbath said...

it's from Rackham miniatures.

Zak Sabbath said...

Not all of your questions make sense, so I'll just answer the ones that do.
"Do you ever feel constrained by rulebooks and editions and the weight of all that came before?"

No.

"Or is it all just grist for the creative mill?"

The good stuff is, the bad stuff I leave out.

Tedankhamen said...

That's the burden of singular consciousness, Zak - we only make complete sense to ourselves.

If all game designers did what you do (i.e. leave out the bad) there'd be a lot less Synnibars, Rifts, WTF D&D and Kickstarters I'd wager...

Jeremy said...

That will do Zak. That will do nicely.