Ludonarrative Dissidents

Overview

"Ludonarrative dissonance" is a term from game-design commentary, describing a moment when the game mechanics pull in one direction but the game story pulls in another, creating dissonance. The ‘Ludonarrative Dissidents’ are three game designers, reviewers and commentators, veterans in the field of ludic narrative, who have come together to discuss the art, science and craft of RPG design by vivisecting game systems and seeing what makes them run.  Your hosts are Ross Payton, Greg Stolze and James Wallis.

Ethos

Every episode of Ludonarrative Dissidents is built around four pillars: What does this game do? How does it do that? How do people play it? Why do they play it that way? (and how well does it succeed?) We examine games from all angles: mechanical, ludic, narrativist, historical, cultural, structural, whether or not it’s fun, and Greg complains about its use of the future-conditional tense. We look at its influences and pedigree, its narrative engine, its world-building, its book-design, and James reveals that he dated the designer’s sister, or something like that. In season 2 we have added episodes that look at specific aspects of RPGs, such as initiative systems, metacurrencies and diceless games.

Origins

The idea behind Ludonarrative Dissidents came from a Twitter discussion in early 2021. Someone was looking for RPG designers to work on a project, someone else suggested Greg and James, and after the two of them politely declined, a third person opined that a podcast with the two talking about games and game design would be quite a thing. Greg and James exchanged a virtual glance across the Atlantic, Greg mentioned the idea to Ross, the three of them filled a Google document with ideas, and the project was born.

Links

ludonarrativedissidents.com https://www.ludonarrativedissidents.com/ - Official website spotify.com https://open.spotify.com/show/1fUlFMSXItwN0luUuoPj5V - Spotify feed podcast.apple.com https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/ludonarrative-dissidents/id1631574681 - Apple Podcasts feed discord.gg https://discord.gg/8duhtFUFEV - Discord server ko-fi.com https://ko-fi.com/s/d4522f9f4f - Ko-Fi page

Other entries

Update log - 10.04.2026 "Visit the library"
Update log

Update log - 10.04.2026 "Visit the library"

Another month, another big update. Happy April everyone.  We have been busy in the background improving Groupfinder to make it an even better place to find players or groups. But in addition to your finding journey, we have also finalized our current version of the library, which will help you all with discovering old and new tools and platforms, content creators, communities and will introduce you to various game systems.  For those, who might be interested - we recently published an article where we examined the statistics and listed the most popular systems according to your posts and groups. The library This is a big one. The library is a comprehensive collection of various tabletop gaming related resources. Whether you are looking for a virtual tabletop to run your games on, or need help creating a map for your campaigns. If you want to learn more about the hobby and discover various content creators, whether a Youtube channel for second-monitor viewing, blogs to read up on various news, guides, tips or other ideas, artists to hire to commission your character's unique artwork, or even podcasts to listen to - the library is the place to find those. Game systems You know Dungeons & Dragons, but do you know about the other systems that exist? Some more specialized in combat, others with more story-driven focus. Or do you want to run a vampire-themed game? Or something set in the space? Take a look at the various game systems, read about them and perhaps you will head back to your own player profile and add some additional systems that you would like to try out. Tools & Platforms The hobby-space is filled with creative people creating various tools for various purposes: mapbuilding, character creation, virtual tabletops, music and sounds, generators, worldbuilding and more. See if there are tools to make your or your group's life easier. Creators Whether you like to watch Youtube videos, listen to podcasts or read blog articles - this is your place to learn more about the nitty-gritty of the hobby. Whether to keep up with the news regarding the TTRPG hobby, follow along someone else's actual play journey or read about the ins and outs of the hobby. Or if you are looking for an artist to commission for an artwork - we have some of those as well. Communities & Events Hosting a public tabletop-related event and want people to discover and join it? Spread the word. Or if you are running a Discord or other type of a community, whether online or offline - this is the place to get the word out. Gather people and grow with the hobby. /images/general-media/1775848937_OGEqvwGB.jpgThe library is evergrowing. Submit your own projects or entries. All the library entries are sorted by recommended first. The more recommendations the entry has, the better it's position will be in their category. If you are interested in featuring your entry, you can get in touch with us and we'll tell you more about how you can get your post to be discovered by more people. As you can currently see, the library in some categories is quite empty. We invite everyone to submit their entry to it. Read more about how to submit here. And visit the library Layout changes In addition, during the past month we have slightly updated the way player and group posts look. Hopefully this will help you introduce yourself or your group a bit better. If you are curious about how to improve your profile even more - go ahead and read this guide article here. In addition to the post layout, you can see our updated footer, providing a better navigation to various bits and pieces of the platform. Also the creator spotlight section has been updated to provide a more clear layout to learn more about various projects in the hobby space. If you have a project you would like to spotlight, you can read more about the whole process here. These spotlighted projects are what help us keep working on the platform, cover our running costs and help us keep it free forever. We polished the chat with a few visual and functional improvements. Users can now @mention someone in the group chat. You can also react to a post, to show support or your feelings towards whatever thing they said. Wide As you can see, the whole platform is now wider (Or if you are on mobile, you can't see. But take our word for it). This improvement will help us provide a better user experience, as our interface is less busy now. The header has been updated and now includes the link to the library. On mobile, you have a brand new menu - again to provide a clearer visual experience and help you navigate the platform even better. Notifications Want to stay updated when someone contacts you? Or a game/player is added that might be interesting to you? You can head over to the Account page and adjust your notifications there. Notifications in the mobile app provide a better preview of what the notification is all about, so you can either swipe it away or open it, should it be important. /images/general-media/1775849670_l0NrsMZa.jpgDon't let yourself get overwhelmed with notifications or e-mails. Choose what is relevant to you and stay in the loop. Unofficial iOS app If you are an iPhone user, you can now see a message at the bottom of the page, that will guide you towards adding our unofficial Groupfinder app on your phone. It will send you relevant notifications and help you keep up with all the important bits. That wraps it up for now Thank you to all who have found their way to Groupfinder. If you have any feedback regarding the platform, please let us know, it doesn't have to be a long in-depth commentary or structured letter. Just get in touch with us or send me a mail (holger@groupfinder.eu) and I promise to read all of your mails.  Whether to praise us, or to let us know of a feature the platform is missing, we welcome both. And as a final note - if you have found Groupfinder to be helpful to you so far. Or you want to help it become even more popular (so you have more players/games to choose from) - spread the word. Tell people on Reddit, Facebook, X, Bluesky, Discord or any other channel about Groupfinder. We will love you to bits. Till next time.

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Nimble
Tabletop Roleplaying Games

Nimble

TTRPG
English
Rules-light
Nimble is a fast, tactical (and 5e compatible), TTRPG. Your game nights are too precious to waste with slow or fiddly rules! Slay the slog using the best elements from the greatest RPGs around. Nimble empowers players and GMs with more interesting choices, less waiting around, and have more fun playing epic stories Description Nimble RPG is designed to prioritize speed, tactical decision-making, and reduced administrative tracking for both players and Game Masters. The system condenses character sheets and streamlines the action economy to prevent long waiting periods between player turns. Its primary design philosophy centers on accelerating combat encounters without sacrificing strategic depth, utilizing highly lethal weapon mechanics and dynamic monster behaviors. The game is offered both as a complete standalone system and as a modular "rules hack" booklet that can be integrated directly into an ongoing Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition campaign. System Overview & Key Features Fast Combat Don’t waste your time rolling to see if you can deal damage, just roll your damage dice! You deal that much damage. Attacks miss on a 1, but rolling the maximum is an EXPLODING Critical Hit! Exploding critical hits Roll the die again and add it to the total. There is no limit to how many times this damage can stack, except your luck! Instant Initiative Get RIGHT into combat with Improved Initiative rules that get players immediately into combat in a way that serves the story without breaking up the flow. Quick to prep Nimble is quick to prep and easy to run. You've got enough going on while GMing—Mechanics are all designed to be easy to manage and track at the table. You can be ready to run an adventure in as little as 5 minutes! And there's no need to for new players to read though endless pages of rules, teach new players as you play. Easy to balance Easy Encounter Creation. No matter the size of your party—whether you play in a cozy group with just 1 or 2 heroes, or a huge group of 8 or more—Encounters are easy and intuitive to build and balance for just the right level of challenge you like. Craft massive scale combat encounters, down to legendary solo encounters. Strategic Weapon System A subtly DEEP weapon system that rewards thoughtful play. No more, “I guess I’ll pick the bigger one...” Every weapon is balanced to have interesting strengths & weaknesses in combat. Additional links nimblerpg.com - Official website and rules repository

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Tabletop Time Roleplay
Actual Play & Podcasts

Tabletop Time Roleplay

TTRPG
English
Actual Play
Tabletop Time is a YouTube channel, podcast, and livestreaming phenomenon devoted to collaborative storytelling through tabletop roleplaying games, as well as miniatures and other somewhat "nerdy" hobbies. It was created by Jazza and his brother Shad to utilize the TTRPG system they invented, Cogent Roleplay. The initial run lasted two years, but due to Jazza's increasingly busy schedule, a four year hiatus was necessary. Now it's back with a vengeance and a new cast. Links youtube.com - Youtube channel spotify.com - Spotify feed podcasts.apple.com - Apple Podcasts feed twitch.tv - Twitch channel patreon.com - Patreon page itstabletoptime.fandom.com - Tabletop Time wiki

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