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Andre Kruppa is an inveterate road GM, bringing his theatrical style of role-playing with props, sound effects, lighting and more to tabletop conventions all over New England, be it in the Call of Cthulhu or Star Wars milieus, or powered by his very own Lucid Dreams game engine.
TARA: How did you get into the tabletop hobby?
It started with a session of basic Dungeons & Dragons in a study hall in 1978 and quickly escalated from there. I was running Dungeons & Dragons within the week. That quickly led to branching out into board games like Avalon Hill’s Starship Troopers, some miniatures gaming, and eventually gothic, weird, and cosmic horror role-playing.
I discovered Runequest in 1979 and it paved the way later for Call of Cthulhu in 1981. I’ve been playing a mix of role-playing, miniatures, and board games ever since!
TARA: What brought you to Carnage originally?
ANDRE: I first came to Carnage because I had re-kindled my interest in historical miniatures gaming. I drove up to play in a few sessions and check it out. This was probably around 2000 or so. Many of the role-playing settings I favor are historical fantasy and historical miniatures games and the research required go hand in hand with my approach toward role-playing settings. I started running games at Carnage the following year!
TARA: What inspired you to develop Lucid Dreams?
ANDRE: I wanted a tool kit to allow a variety of grittier role-playing scenarios set in any era with a broad range of tools for the Game Master. The Lucid Dreams Role-playing Engine offers a skill-based system with increases gained from use and training. Horror, fear, and insanity effects are modeled. Options include organizations to support Player Character operations. Resources include Wealth, with abstracted mechanics to reduce record keeping, and Social Class, to help define character background and station, as well as options for Contacts, Fame, Retainers, Agents, Glory, Wealth, Spies, Military Force, and more to be used as needed Combat is lethal, revolves around a simple Shock Test, and is fairly fast-paced.
TARA: What makes Lucid Dreams unique?
ANDRE: The system facilitates a number of campaign styles allowing for direct challenges as well as games involving action in the wings from spying to military raids. The rules for organizations allow modeling of anything from a feudal estate to a detective agency or governmental branch office to help support play.
TARA: What is your most memorable moment at the tables at a Carnage convention?
ANDRE: There have been so many fun moments. I think we all do this largely for the shared excitement of a given collaborative scene or story. For me, some of the most fun is at the end when the madness and mayhem ensues.
To read more about the Lucid Dreams role-playing game, visit Andre’s website, Game Soapbox, and like Game Soapbox on Facebook. You can get a peek of theatrical role-playing on Game Soapbox Productions’ YouTube channel. The very bold will find Andre running games of Derelict Adrift and The Missing at Carnage 21 this year. After that, book Andre to run games through Dark Phoenix Events.
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