Ben Rosenbloom's Boring Machine

I just drilled into each of the four classes of Ways and Means, looking at each ability and trying to understand how they combine into the gestalt of a class in Heart, in an attempt to grapple with what is going on in Heart design and what makes that design work for me, or not work for me. As one last design exercise / attempt at fairness / victory lap, I'm taking the boring machine and drilling into the design of the Xanthous Zealot, the class I wrote in Heartsong #1 !

The fourth and final part of my design deep dive into the classes of Ways and Means! This entry concerns the Witness, a bard-alike who just loves to see all the other player characters accomplish their dreams. The goal for this project is to try to isolate the mechanical design from the thematic elements and analyze how the two inform each other, to see what works for me and what doesn't.

Part three of four in my deep dive into the class design in Ways and Means! Today's blog is on the Snail Pilgrim, a holy wanderer with the weight of a world on their back. The goal is to talk mostly about the mechanical design, with some reference to the thematic elements and how the two inform each other, to see what works for me and what doesn't.

Part two of four in my project to break down the design of the classes in Ways and Means! Today's is the Crawler, the ultimate dungeon delver as shaped by the Heart. The goal is to see if I can isolate the mechanical design from the thematic elements and analyze how the two inform each other, to see what works for me and what doesn't.

As I threatened in my big post on Ways and Means, I will be going through each of the four classes and talking about, line by line, what works for me and what doesn't. It's my hope to be fairly generous, but I don't make any claims towards objectivity. I'll be going through the list in order - first up is the Blightborn.

I'm back for another archive delve! I'm not digging too deeply through my pile - I'm reading Ways and Means , the (fairly) recent supplement for Heart: The City Beneath ! I took a quick glance through a few weeks ago, but I haven't had a chance to really sit down and grapple with anything yet. I'm excited to read!

I've been continuing to mess around writing for Heart (in fact, you can read some more of my design work in the 70-page fanzine , recently published, which includes really fun writing from a plethora of others), so today I'm back with a review of Bloodthirsty , by E.R.F. Jordan! 

Time for another delve! Hopefully without too much resistance (this is a joke about Heart's Delve procedure). Today, I'm reading the very-recent first-draft pdf release of Dagger in the Heart !

Work on NEW BLOOD continues! While I'm thinking about designing for Heart, I've been wanting to read as much as I can. Today, I'm looking at a cool little supplement, a collection of a bunch of character options, including what are called "Extra Advances," which were in Spire but not Heart  (or the core book at least). It's called ARCANA, and it's by Eric Scott!

I've been plugging away at NEW BLOOD , my supplement for HEART: The City Beneath , and running some play-by-post games, and recently there was even a video review, so I think it's safe to say I'm a little heart pilled right now. Ah, sorry, I'm getting word that that's a different thing. Anyway, it's been a kind of busy month, actually, between updates. I've been really enjoying my time in Heart's system and setting! But I missed reading and writing about reading - so I thought I would take a look at some of the other stuff that's come out for Heart recently. Today, I'm taking a look through Misha Handman's Called to the Heart !