Roll For Kindness

I've written about choosing the right game for your applied group in the past, but since then the landscape has changed. Initially, the options for applied RPG groups were limited to a handful of mainstream RPGs such as D&D and Pathfinder. Now

Here is the VOD for our PAX East panel on using games to talk about difficult topics that I spoke on. Check it out!

The Panel Playing with Knives at Pax EastBeen some time since I've posted, and that by no means indicates I've been inactive. Quite the contrary. For the purposes of this blog, I've hit most of my big applied rpg general education milestones- indicated by

By @Culliope Peter makes a great case in the “No Phones” article for why phones should be allowed for neurodivergent players at the TTRPG table. I completely agree! However, I think that his article is the seed for an even bigger conversation to be

"No phones at the table!" This is one of the most common rules I see as part of applied RPG groups, specifically ones that look at teaching social skills to autistic individuals. The notion that screentime is a problem, whereas face to face communication

By Culliope We hear a lot about safety tools in RPGS these days. Safety tools are agreements at the table about the content and tone of the story, as well as pre established routines for how to flag a particular bit of content, conversation,

I recently watched a talk about RPG safety tools, and I've been thinking about them nonstop since then. It's essential for players to feel safe and welcome at the TTRPG table, but to get the most out of safety tools, it's important to reflect

By @culliope I had the pleasure of once again attending PAX Unplugged in Philadelphia, Dec 11th and 12th, 2021. It was wonderful to be back at this con after losing last year to the Covid haze. I hosted and presented on the “Can We

By @culliope People are often fascinated to hear we have a 65+ participant middle school DnD Club. In many ways it is both harder and much easier than you might think. The most important thing to keep in mind, as always, is that we

For applied RPG games to work you need to be able to give every student time in the spotlight- that is, a scene, encounter, or aspect of the game that they get to engage with directly. This is fundamental to any applied RPG work,

A few months ago, I had the pleasure of speaking with Anthony Bean, founder and Director of Geek Therapeutics. After talking shop about applied RPGs and our shared vision for the future of the field, he invited me to become certified as a Therapeutic

I've recently had a chance to look at a few educational RPGs, and was thinking to myself, "What is the learning goal here? How would assessment work? What are the students going to carry away? How does the design of this game feed into

Hello Travelers, Heroes’ Hall is in full swing. I have affectionately been calling it the Heroes’ Hall Hydra - as one person decides it isn’t for them, two take their place! With three weeks under our belts, we have filled nine tables of

It's important to find ways to reward creativity and exploration as well as combat. (Source: Legend of Zelda)One of the fundamental pieces of RPGs is the concept of rewards- from XP that unlocks additional abilities to gold that can be used to purchase

This is, as the title says, a list of 100 warm up questions. I've spoken about how to use warm up questions before, but I wanted to make a more thorough list for people to use. Many of these are ones I've used, others

Years ago, I read the Cyberpunk Manifesto, and was inspired. Sadly, my career in cybersecurity was the bland corporate variety, but the same energy from that piece has stuck with me for years. On a whim, I've decided to transcribe an Applied GM's Manifesto.

RPGs With Kids ... Where Do We Start? The first in a How To series about after school DnD with middle school students. Lesson #1 - S’Killin’ It. I am delighted to announce that our Heroes’ Hall afterschool DnD Club is restarting in October

The Dryad Doesn’t Fall Far From the Tree By Culliope If you had never heard of a tree spirit before, what do you think it would look like? Wikipedia tells us that dryads are nature spirits that live in oak trees (drys = oak

Peter's note: I recently decided to diversify the content I host on Roll for Kindness, and could think of no one better than my good friend and applied RPG colleague Maryanne Cullinan. I'm very excited to welcome her to Roll for Kindness, where she

On the panel at PAX West on applied RPGs, there was a QR code that led to a quest sheet- a tool for aspiring applied GMs to fill out to help guide their passage into using applied RPGs in their own community. Check out

Ava and friendsI completely forgot to mention, I wrote published a TTRPG for Social Cipher's Ava, meant to be used in conjunction with the curriculum for Ava Episode 2, which focuses on coping strategies in the face of stressful situations. This TTRPG can be

Today I just want to share the panel I did at PAX with the amazing Alexander Pereira, Amelia Herbst, Joe LeConte, Maryanne Cullinan, and myself on using RPGs in an applied fashion. It was a packed panel, and an absolute joy to share our

Many neurodivergent people have had the experience of trying to fit in as normal, and never quite doing it right. Trying to mask oddities and mannerisms to fit in with the cool kids, only to have them see through the ruse and see that

I was recently talking with a therapist buddy about applied RPGs, and I started talking about the work I do with in-home services. He said, "God, I wish I could do that, how do you get into that?" So, today, I'm going to talk

Wearing a robe and a bald cap are not on this list, but never a bad idea.Being a GM for applied RPGs is very different than being a GM for traditional RPGs, and there's a number of skills that you need to master