Dave Kizzia of Monkey Fun Studios

I have been singing the praises of Spirit of 77 since I started this blog about a month ago. I recently interviewed Dave Kizzia, co writer of the game on a podcast I co-host called Word Bros. I figured since there is a bit of cross over, you might want to take a look. If you've ever wanted to write your own game or have an interest in the process, give this a watch.

So Many Games So Little Time

As for this very instant, I am currently playing in three games. I've compiled a list. See below.

4th Edition D&D
Pathfinder
Spirit of 77.

I'm planning to add a Stafinder game (or two) to this already crowded list. Some of you may be reading this thinking "Three games isn't that many! What is this dude talking about!" Factor in I am a stay at home father of two, a good husband, a professional comic book writer, a podcaster and now the author of this blog...What I'm saying is my time is I got a lot of stuff going on, but I want to play more games!I want to play ALL THE GAMES! These titles I find especially interesting!

Hollow Earth Expeditions: All the old school pulp action in on game! Sign me up. Hollow Earth was one of the books I presented to the Pathfinder group. We ended up going with Spirit of 77, which if you've read previous posts is a wonderful game. That being said, I'd being lying if I said I wasn't a bit disappointed in the group's choice. I LOVE the pulp genre. The character classes are ripped from the pages of King Solomon's Mines, The Lost World and A Princess of Mars. The settings presented for adventuring  range from the bustling concrete jungle of New York City to the actual uncharted jungles of Central and South America. I played a mod at GenCon and I was hooked.

Tales From the Loop: Speaking of mods at GenCon, I also spent a bit of time in the world presented in Tales from the Loop and I was impressed. Think Stand by Me meets District 9 but with robots. TFtL follows a group of pre-teen 80's kids exploring the strangeness of their town, which happens to reside in the shadow of a large particle accelerator. Pre-teens and large experimental science, what could go wrong?


Star Trek Adventures: I admit. I am a huge Star Trek fan. So much so I even gave The Orville a shot. Being a kid of the late 80's early 90's, my favorite era of Trek is TNG and DS9. This game lives and breathes in the Berman/Braga Trek universe. Want to play a Bajoran tactical officer fighting off the Dominion? Or maybe a Klingon security officer chasing a Ferengi arms dealer? Than this is the game for you. And me! Let me play too!

There you have it. My wish list of games. Tell me, what games are out there that you want to play but just can't seem to find the time?

A Starfinder Poem.

Two word.
Space Minotaur.
Let's make it happen.

Page Twelve and the Creative Player

As I was prepping for my latest installment of Heavy Gigs in Sea Side City, our Spirit of 77 podcast, I scoured through the rule book looking for helpful info.

Anton, our DJ (GM) had put my character, the ex-pro wrestler turned PI Buddy White in a no win situation. In a bit of quality story telling by Anton, the repercussions of Buddy's actions in the first secession were coming to haunt him at the end of the second. See, what had happened was, Buddy broke into a hotel room to investigate a potential client for Miss Sweetwell (the disco owner, arms dealer Buddy works for.) During the B&E, an old woman pulled a pistol on ol' Buddy, who was trying desperately to talk his way out of this heated situation. His chatter only enraged the old woman, mainly because she knew he was bs'ing her, so this old lady fired a warning shot at Buddy. So, in a moment of panic, Buddy White, with all the might of his six foot 4 inch 246 pound frame hit this old broad in the face, crumpling her old bones to a pile of dust. Buddy quickly fled from the scene. Fast forward to the end of secession two, that same old woman and a gang of goons show up ambushing Buddy and his pals. I needed a way out and I needed one quick. This is where the players guide comes in.

Spirit of 77 is not your average roleplaying game. The writers tell the players that the book is only a base of rules and if those rules they have constructed hamper the fun don't use them.Wow! this, as a creative player is great. The writers are actively encouraging the players to play their game their way! The rules also tells the players to help the DJ set the mood of the scene by adding props, scenery, characters and other items that could move the game along. I found this nugget of salvation on page twelve! Good old page 12! This was my way out! Using page twelve as a guide and bit of my own creativity, I envisioned a window cleaning scaffolding high  atop the building on the street where the old woman's car pulled up. In my minds eye, I'll have Buddy pull his trusty .38 and file a shot that will cut through the rope sending the scaffolding crashing down on the cars below, giving Buddy and his pals a window to escape,in a move Jim Rockford would be proud of. Did my idea work? You will have to listen to the third episode of "Heavy Gigs in Sea Side City" to find out.

The point is, it is nice to see the creators of the game give  the players room to be creative by not letting the rules of the game hamper the fun. Because at the end of the day, RPGs should be fun, right?

Dead Suns Incident at Absalom Station Chat

Wait! Oh, yes wait a minute Mister Postman! That's right mama, I got my Starfinder Dead Suns mod today. Well, technically I got it yesterday but I didn't have a chance to sit down and write a brag post about getting it. I am pumped! Obviously! I am posting about it!

I bought the mod because I've decided to GM a game and figured this would be the quickest and easiest way to get the players accustomed to the new system. Well that and I've never GM'ed a game before. Hold on, let's put a pin in that last statement (I will post about being a first time GM later in the month) and focus on the mod.


The adventure is pretty straight forward. A ghost ship pulling a mysterious asteroid has parked itself right outside of  Absalom Station. Its the PC's job to answer all the questions that normally come with an empty ship towing a rock. The mod also features a few new monsters/aliens, which serves as a nice preview until the Alien Archive hits the streets in October.

My fav of the new aliens/monsters is the Bone Trooper. What is a Bone Trooper you ask? Well, let me tell ya! Using space magic and technological experiments powerful space magic folks have been able to reanimate the dead. Some of these creatures are mindless, boring boobs easily controlled by their creators. While other, these Bone Troopers preserve their intellects, memories and personalities! That's right! Walking, talking space skeletons with all of their meatbag persona. We're talking space Skeletor, BABY!!! I think I found my PC race, that's of my GM is cool with it. There are a few stats for the creature and with a little reverse engineering and some input from the GM I should be able to make a first level BT for my homebrew game.

Heavy Gigs in Seas Side City Episode 2

The plot thickens for our B-Sides as they track the StarFall Daisho to the Iron Crab market only to be confronted by Chairman Kaga and his elite army of killer chefs! But will they be friend or foe? Join DJ Anton K and B-sides John, Bob, Jason and Jim in their next 70s-tastic adventure!

This is a play through pod that sounds more like an old school radio play. We have a great DJ and wonderful players. Give this pod a listen. Hell, listen to all the play through pods on the Good Pencil network.

Heavy Gigs Episode 2

Gen Con 50

GEN CON WAS AMAZING!!!! WHY AM I SHOUTING!!! BECAUSE IT WAS AWESOME!!!!

I gotta tell you, on my way to Indy (a two hour drive from Cincinnati) I had no idea what to expect. It sounds crazy but I was also a little nervous. Why? I have no idea, just felt a bit apprehensive. I had built the event up so much in my mind, I was afraid the event wouldn't live up to expectations. Boy, was I wrong.

The show was sold out. That means single day badges as well as four day passes were gone. I think this also played into my nervousness. The thought of all those people made me a little uneasy but again, I was mistaken. The space is HUGE!!!  Three halls of the convention center was filled with vendors. Paizo had set up an impressive make-shift store jammed packed with all things kinds of goodies. Well, everything minus the new Starfinder core rule book. Those bad boys sold out Thursday afternoon. Yep, the entire inventory for a four day show gone in an afternoon.  There were three halls dedicated to magic and other card/board games. All of the ballrooms that line the hallways of the convention center were all filled with people playing games.

But that's not all. The show takes over downtown. The street in front of the convention center is shut down and 40 food trucks lined up to serve the hungry con goers things like pizza, BBQ, Chinese noodles and evn fro-yo! All of the adjacent hotels' ballroom and conference room space were filled with games, many which ran until 3am.  Lucas Oil stadium, home of the Colts was transformed into a game library, filled with tables and gamers. Meaning your wizard was free to goblins on the 50 yard line! Crazy right? Nope, not the craziest part. The rest of the stadium, was turned into a LARPing dungeon crawl! Yep! A real life crawl in the hallways of Lucas Oil Stadium! how crazy is that!

There was way too much going on for my one day visit however, I don't feel like I was short changed. I played in two con organized games (Tales from the Loop and Hollow Earth Adventures. Both of which I will discuss later in some detail) and I was able to purchase some cool stuff from the many vendors.

If you love gaming and never attended you should go. it was that much fun. I have decided I will go every year for the rest of my life! See you there!

Game Night! Spirit of 77

By far, the funnest game I am currently playing in (we will see if that is the case after I get my Starfinder book) is Spirit of 77 from Monkeyfun Studios. For those of you who have never heard of the game, Spirit of 77 started out on Kickstarter (which seems to be the birthplace of many inventive games) and after a successful campaign the game went game shops and sites. Spirit of 77 is the exploitation film of table top RPGs.  Players can play boppers (think "The Warriors"), sleuths (Kojack or Columbo) or a good old fashioned tough guy (Kane from Kung Fu) in an alternate reality where Nixon  was never impeached and Agnew was sent to Mars, or something like that.

Anyway, the game is a real blast. The system is a easy to pick up D6 system with little math needed. The core rule book even goes as far to say the most important rule of the game is to "have fun," and "if something in the rules is not fun, then ignore it, change it, or make something up."  It is truly a players game with the point being to have a good time. And man, do they hit the mark!

If you are a fan of exploitation films of the 70's or the Rockford Files, this is the table top RPG for you.