The 4 Marys I would argue are from a *different* girl's comic tradition, not least because they start in the 50s and keep those social norms to an extent.

4) It's almost always centered in play. Very different types of play, but it's rare to see a LRP not meant to be played. Which I think gives it focus or to be less charitable, stops it becoming too self indulgent.

As I said, still forming thoughts on this so welcome other ideas.

/END

And exists alongside a lot of people just trying to work in established types of LRP and make those games as good as they can be. Ironically, I think "we must innovate" has been a trap for RPGs.

American Freeform (at least my understanding as an outsider) arises because some North American designers are heavily influenced by Nordic larp but feel the need for a term to tease out what they're doing differently. It's been much more organic.

3) One problem with a lot of innovation and form pushing in TTRPGs is it starts with that rather than that being an reaction to necessity. Turku arises because people are (hyperbolically) describing their own playstyle.

Teasing out some ideas rather than having a developed theory yet. I think some major factors:

1) LRP doesn't have a single ur game it's forced to define itself against.

2) We broke from TTRPGs and became our own thing *very* early on, giving us room to grow at our own pace.

En Garde. A fascinating glimpse of a path not taken with RPGs.

I think I'm even less of a military engagement guy than you and you're not exactly a massive military engagement guy.

"Were superhero comics big in the UK in the 1970s"?

Dunno. Would you like to hear me pontificate on the moral assumptions of Misty's readership for the next hour?

Being an autodidact is weird because you're all like "Ah, did you know the Muggletonians rejected reason as contrary to the divine" and then someone asks you who won the battle of Marston Moor and I don't fucking know I find battles much less interesting than historical theology and politics.

If I swore at a Labour MP in the street we'd get weeks of agonised editorials about the lack of civility in politics.

If the UK left needs anything it's to rediscover parapolitics. If people don't take deep politics seriously, that's when you leave a game for conspiracists on one hand and people who don't think states ever do anything wrong on the other.

MI5 have been infiltrating and disrupting far left UK groups since the 1950s. The idea they magically lost interest after the 90s is laughable.

Blimey, I didn't expect Ed to stand again.

Remembering the absolute raging when Pidcock said she wouldn't be friends with a Tory. (I have other issues with Pidcock, not least her transphobia, but she was completely in the right there and the response showed how many politicians see it all as a jolly game).

I did a bit on this previously - thesocialreview.substack.com/p/starmer-an...

Stuart Dye also has a good run down of some of the issues - stuartdye.wordpress.com/2022/02/14/h...

(Apologies for the fact it's Substack. Very much wasn't the case when I wrote that article).

(I've never been uncritical of Corbyn. Just recognised that a large amount of the criticism was either fuckwitted, bad faith or both)

It's genuinely funny that the Starmer stans on here are so busy trying to claim that Corbyn is somehow relevant to the Mandelson scandal they haven't noticed the absolute clusterfuck going on in Yorp.

"It's impossible for me to go any lower in people's estimation. Checkmate, lefties"

That is not in fact what the scandal is. It's that Mandelson was appointed despite keeping contacts with Epstein *after* he was jailed.

I know this will come as news to you, but as an American it doesn't actually matter whether you like Starmer or not.

Have you seen the polling? You certainly aren't a woke *majority*.

We regret to inform you that a man known for boasting of his mastery of the "dark arts" may in fact be a bit suss.

I'm wondering (and it's not really my call because I'm not a student) if this is a way of breaking this and exposing the hypocrisy. Students invite a member of Bash Back or Take Back Power or someone who fought alongside the YPG to give a speech on campus.

Remember working in Waterstones. Better for this than many workplaces, but you'd still get people taking the fact we couldn't order books that'd been out of print for 30 years as a personal insult.

(From a publisher perspective, my more expensive LARP has got about four times the sales of the one I put out dirt cheap in the hope of getting visibility. It has more views, but that didn't translate into sales).

Same here. £2 for something like VTT character tokens is one thing, but I assume a quality drop off at the lowest RPG prices. Not universal, but enough of a pattern that I suddenly become cautious.

Have you read Pratchett's Monstrous Regiment? Really nice (and funny) take on this trope.

I don't think Steam Highwayman is. Ghosts of Craven Manor is, but only Kindle. If you're looking for PDFs, I'd recommend Ace Gamebooks/Jonathan Green on Drivethru RPG. He does a lot of retellings of old stories like Peter Pan and Alice in Wonderland.

I would also point out that the modern gamebook sector is healthier and more fun than it's been for decades.

Start with Steam Highwayman or The Ghosts of Craven Manor.