Give your worlds and characters combat more depth than ever before by thinking about the stories behind their martial arts.
When creating your character, when was the last time you considered how they learned to fight with any real weight? If you've ever done it, congrats! You got us beat. That's why we've got an incredible guest on today to share how to add an onion's worth of layers to our characters fighting styles. James Mendez Hodes has written, designed, and culturally consulted for a ton of different games, and also has deep personal experience with martial arts and world history. This leaves him super equipped to guide us down the rabbit hole of martial culture in a way nobody else can. Also, he's a senior developer on Avatar: The Last Airbender Roleplaying Game, currently in the middle of a wildly successful Kickstarter campaign.
In The Strategy Stateroom, James Mendez Hodes shares some enlightening points about integrating martial arts more meaningfully. First, getting away from thinking about Monks as the only martial artists. Anyone who fights learned to fight somewhere, and anyone who learned to fight is a martial artist. Then we can dive into a real world martial arts style, whether it be Brazilian capoeira or French canne de combat, and learn about the culture that surrounds it. There's the philosophies that define it, the legendary fighters within it, or how it came to be, all of which can enrich your characters.
Then, in The Heroes Stage we get to know James Mendez Hodes a little better, and get into what he's working on now, Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game. Here's just a sampling of what it brings to the table. The game does an incredible job of guiding players through the character creation process, allowing full creative control over their bending style and even giving the framework for a super quick party history allowing you to jump right in. It also focuses on the emotional weight of conflict in a way that totally respects how the shows handled it, allowing you to emulate the stakes and energy that we're familiar with. There's so much good stuff here, you've got to check it out for yourself.
Follow James Mendez Hodes and his works:
Website and Blog: jamesmendezhodes.com
Twitter: @lulavampiro
Facebook: lula.vampiro
Patreon: patreon.com/mndz
Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game Quickstart Guide
Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game Kickstarter: Ending Sept. 02 2021