Leonard Balsera

I'm only partway into the book, but I'm really impressed. I should mention that I'm not paying a ton of attention to the game mechanic; my main interest is as a fan of the series and as a world-building would-be GM.

As a fan, it's a great read. Aside from the mindbending meta-ness of reading an RPG guide where the original books' protagonist is commenting on the RPG's guide to character creation in which a hypothetical player (named after the series' author) is creating him, the protagonist, as a character in the game... yes, sorry, my sentence structure can't even make it clear, let alone do it justice. You'll just have to take my word that it's charmingly recursive.

Aside from that, as I said, it's a great read. The underlying conceit is that the character Billy is writing a role playing game based on Dresden's life and the supernatural aspects of their world, and has asked Dresden and Bob to look it over. Their marginalia are charming, and often illuminating or funny - a bit like Rowling's Harry Potter textbooks, but the technique is much more successful here. Butcher is credited as an author, and I'm sure he had a close eye on it.

The art is a bit of a mix - some from the comics, and I believe some is original. It's all good, though, particularly the original work.

I don't know the base game system they're using, so I don't know if this is typical, but I was very impressed by the emphasis on world-building and character development. I'm working up a 4th ed. setting right now, and I've found this book really, really useful in helping me figure out how my world, my plot, my themes, and my characters are going to work together and interact. It's making me add aspects to my game that will give it a real richness, at least in my mind.

My only problem is that a paper copy is $50.00 US. Ouch! Uh, Christmas is coming?… (altro)

The second volume of The Dresden Files RPG is the worldbook. It contains a short story from Jim Butcher, a section on the factions and conflicts of the supernatural world, and writeups of all the various generic creatures seen thus far in the story as well as almost every character to get a name, complete with much in-character commentary and speculation from Billy the Werewolf, Harry Dresden, and Bob the Skull. The final chapter on Occult Chicago is not so much a sourcebook as a really well-written overview of all the ideas in Chicago that a gamemaster could riff on to create plots, full of keywords to guide a quick trip through Google or a leisurely afternoon at the library. (It’s also a fine way to get into the occult-conspiracy frame of mind before picking up a history book for a location that you want to use as a setting.)

This is a valuable volume for a gamemaster, even if they aren’t planning on running within the stock “Dresdenverse”, because it has lots and lots of good examples to answer the “How would I write up a character like ____________?” question. There’s a wiki where gamemasters are sharing their city ideas, similar to the writeup of Occult Chicago.… (altro)