Mapril Books

 I read a lot of things in April and also one thing in March. I found a lot of them disappointing.

The last of last year's books

I wasn't reading as much and I forgot to keep posting reviews here, so here's a catch-up for the books I read last year, to be followed by a catch-up for the books I read this year, and then hyopefully more regular posts after that.

Neither Gods Nor Genies

In Game Masters Aren't Gods... They're Genies, Neal Litherland argues that the job of a GM (and it's telling that he calls it a job) is "to create challenges ... decide what treasure the players find, what allies they make, and ... do all these things in service to the players." He sees the game as being akin to a book that the players will want to keep reading. In a related discussion on Discord he made it even plainer, casting the GM in the role of a performer and other players as the audience.

There are a couple of big assumptions at play here and I disagree with both of them.