Gamer

After wanting to try it for a long time, I finally got to try Dogs in the Vineyard at Trondheim's annual games convention, Hexcon 2009 (writeup here). After just a short little taste, I decided I absolutely HAD to have Dogs in my collection.

It dropped into my mailbox the other day, and I pretty much started reading immediately. The first thing that popped out at me was the fact that Dogs, like most indie-RPG's I've read, is a compelling read. It is well written, and draws you in, not wanting to let you go before you're done.

A guy called John Harper, wrote the following about Dogs:

I have Dogs in my hands right now, and it's like holding a burning brand. But do I want to let go? No. I want to be *marked*.

It is so very true, and I couldn't agree more.

The strong points of Dogs are:

• Simple character creation
• Simple tools for town and NPC creation
• System built to prevent railroading

A great thing about Dogs is that, even for a con one-off session, you can justify spending two hours out of as little as a three to four-hour session on character creation. Character creation will obviously be quicker if the players know the system, but even with players that don't, it's pretty impressively quick.

As far as GM'img goes, Dogs has what might be the best mantra ever; Roll the dice or say yes.

When it comes to Dogs, I say "Yes".