Frustration to Freedom is a short book by Kenneth Norris, structured as a 30-day course. The subtitle is “30 Days to Legendary Solo Roleplaying Adventures”.
The PDF is available here: DriveThruRPG link. (At the time when I’m writing this, the price is $0.)
Notes
- The book goes straight into Day 1 – there’s no introduction. The description on the book’s DriveThruRPG page implies that the “Frustration” in the title refers to difficulties with scheduling roleplaying games with groups. And so “Freedom” is being able to play games whenever you want, in whatever style you want.
- Each day has its own topic and some exercises for putting the ideas of the topic into practice. The topics include “Discover Your Ideal Roleplaying Campaign”, “GM & PC Turns”, “Solo Engines: Shallow vs. Deep Questions”, “Journal Styles” and several “Creative Tools”.
- In general, I don’t think the exercises would take particularly long to complete, although some could be extended and explored in depth.
Reflections
I think that working through the course day by day could be useful for people who are new to solo gaming and are looking for an introduction before getting started. People who have already experimented with solo gaming may prefer to skip to the topics that are most relevant to challenges they’ve experienced.
Day 2 discusses freewriting (quickly writing down current thoughts without editing) as one of the recommended creative tools. This is a method that’s worked well for me in solo gaming – if I reach a point where I don’t have much inspiration for what happens, I sit down with a piece of paper and just write down possibilities while trying not to worry about whether they’re good, relevant or plausible. This has always produced a set of workable ideas (so far).
The book has a bonus lesson titled “Theme and the Unified Story”. I agree with the author that thinking about the theme (or themes) of a solo game can give the narrative more focus and make the experience more satisfying. A theme can also give inspiration for the “narrative trajectory” mentioned in the Solo Game Master’s Guide. A solo player can establish themes before starting, but other themes may emerge, and it may be useful to look for these and reflect on them while the game is progressing.
Related
If you’re wondering what I mean by “Solo Gaming”, see my introductory post for this category: About the “Solo Gaming” category