Latest from the Labyrinth #12
Last from the labyrinth?Surely not!
Hello and welcome to the February edition of Latest from the Labyrinth: my original intent with this post was to expand upon and clarify my blogpost of 23rd January, which announced a planned 4 month interruption to output on the Alone in the Labyrinth Blog, terminating in June of this year. However, as this post began to grow and the month of February began to shrink the task became increasingly daunting.
All I really need to say is that I’ve not been very well, physically or mentally, and some time to focus on filling less unwell is currently being taken. Aware that this might sound dramatic or worrying for some subscribers, I should add that I don’t anticipate this having any serious consequences. I’m just a bit burned out and need a rest.
Prior to this I was able to make the following posts:
A play report of the last 1-hour sandbox game, https://aloneinthelabyrinth.blogspot.com/2024/01/the-one-hour-pariah-sandbox-city-of.html
My (tongue in cheek?) version of the New Universal Resolution Mechanic:
https://aloneinthelabyrinth.blogspot.com/2024/01/the-one-hour-pariah-sandbox-city-of.html
The weekly Pariah 1-hour sandbox games are currently on a much shorter hiatus, and I’m planning to pick them up again next month.
The Bloggies
I was really pleased to be nominated for this year’s (OSR?) RPG blog awards, THE BLOGGIES, hosted by Zedeck Siew. If you’ve read my blog for any period of time it won’t surprise you to learn that Zedeck is probably my favourite RPG writer, so I was even more thrilled to be picked out from among the nominees as a finalist.
The post was my attempt to turn reaction rolls into a universal resolution mechanic, within the framework of an animist paracosm. Personally it felt very much like a quick sketch of an idea, but I’m glad it resonated with whoever nominated me:
https://aloneinthelabyrinth.blogspot.com/2023/12/ultimate-animist-mechanic-everything-is.html
Of course, such a threadbare post was never going to go the distance in the competition’s “knockout” format: to extend the metaphor, it was punching above its weight, and was fortunate to be spared some clunking fists of genuine heavyweights in later rounds. I’m talking Arnold K, Marcia B and some other first names with last name initialled. Esteemed friends Ms. Screwhead and Ènziramire were also scrapping out with other luminaries… and one of Ènziramire’s made it all the way!
The winning post: “PF2E’s The Mwangi Expanse and the strange career of Black Atlanticism🥇”
Other material
This post was brought to my attention, just as I was thinking about consigning my psychocartography blog into the dustbin of history:
https://choir-of-fire.bearblog.dev/psychogeography-and-the-glog/
Coda
To conclude: I am tired and depressed and the act of typing is nauseating. Nonetheless I will try to glue some words together next month (which is in a few days).