Drow Are (Not) Terrorists — “You have joined the Ministry of Our Hidden Mistress, a paramilitary cult that worships a forbidden goddess, and sworn in blood to avenge the wrongs placed upon you and your people. You have made an oath to fight the high elves, to subvert and capture their resources, and to take…

Obviously, D&D is one of them — Almost all of these games are much-beloved examples of old school gaming. They also suck. They have overly-complex rulesets and boring or overdone settings. They all look like rulebooks. There are pages upon pages that are wall-to-wall text. Even the lore sections tend to be text-plosions. Character creation feels like…

4 chess “puzzles” and “tips” to ponder while you unionize your workplace or protest colonialism — “It was the dumb way the pawns went off and slaughtered their fellow pawns while the kings lounged about doing nothing that always got him; if only the pawns united, maybe talked the rooks round, the whole board could’ve been a republic in a dozen moves.” - Terry Pratchett, Thud …

Queen’s Quadrille, Hippodrome, and Solitaire Chess — In an alternate universe, chess is mainly a platform for puzzles. Very few people play that weird pvp variant. In that universe, REAL chess players play alone. Queen’s Quadrille A solitaire variant on a 4x4 board. Plop down all non-pawn pieces of a standard chess set randomly. Then, remove one queen. The…

Or, Axis & Allies for Protesters — Bloc by Bloc: Uprising takes place in an unnamed any-city. It could be Athens. It could be Ferguson. It could be Oaxaca. It could be Tehran. It could be anywhere people have decided that the state is corrupt and illegitimate. I rarely buy in to crowdfunding campaigns, but some games…

Garry Kasparov vs Elon Musk Retired chess titan Garry Kasparov recently gave Elon Musk what-for after he suggested that they redo the sham referendums in captured Ukraine territories, this time with UN supervision. Never mind that that’s not how sovereignty works. The CEO of Explodo Cars also suggested that Ukraine should write off Crimea. That’s…

For those who don’t know about the Magnus Carlsen/Hans Niemann nonsense: After losing to Hans Niemann at the Sinquefield Cup, Magnus Carlsen strongly implied that Hans cheated. Magnus recently followed that up with a statement that stopped short of outright accusing Niemann of cheating. The chess community is now awash…