I am getting the house ready for friends to come over for what is going to be our last gaming session for, at least, awhile. We could game with one kid, and we could game with two kids, one of whom pretty much just needed to sleep or nurse. But now that we've got two who need attention and stimulation, the game just isn't working. I let our GM know that the Damsel and I had to drop out, and he was bummed, but seemed to understand that it was in no way a reflection on his game. We were having a great time in those moments when we weren't stressed about the Dude or the Bud. When they're older and can play by themselves a bit more, we'd like to play again.

Also have let my superhero game stutter and die, which bums me a little bit, but is only fair. It was started as a way to get the Damsel some with-friends socialization time post-baby-arrival, and given that she had to drop out to tend to the kids, it was turning into, well, not-fun-ness for the family.

Someday, there will be gaming again. For now, we will be good parents.

Looks like we're gearing up to write next week. We've got our tools where we need them, and we've got a story that is going to hit hard and often. Now we just need to, well, do it.

One of the things that we're kicking around right now is the notion of consequences for choices. We know what the story choices for major game moments are, but as the game systems start to come alive, we're talking with combat designers and systems dudes to figure out what we can actually do with minimal game-breakyness. Can we despawn a bunch of one group and spawn in a bunch of another group instead, to show that you've driven the pixies away so that the forest goblins can take over the forest? Can we affect the price of moonberries to reflect the fact that you burned down moonberry forest? Can we give you Whirlwind Attack as a free combat feat to reflect the combat skills you learned while fighting the pixies? Sometimes we can. Sometimes we can't. We'll see what makes it into the game. The talks so far have been scary-good, and we've got systems and combat guys who really love the idea of long-lasting in-game consequences for your choices, which makes it a lot more likely to happen.

What's the coolest consequence you've seen in a game? What made you feel like you were really affecting the world?