Apparently quite a few folks are coming here from a Google search for “Rule 0.” Perhaps I can explain, and even if you weren’t intending to find my blog here, perhaps you’ll stay a little while.

I’m a computer scientist, and we start counting at 0. It’s just the way we do it, so to me, it makes perfect sense to start counting from 0. To others, who start usually start at 1, 0 implies something special, something before the beginning of the counting. Rule 0, therefore, is meant to imply something beyond an ordinary first rule, one that comes before all others. 3^rd edition D&D popularized Rule 0 as “Have fun,” meaning that any of the other rules and trivialities could be discarded in favor of this, the main point of the game. You might also think of Rule 0 as “this is a game,” (and therefore you should approach the game at hand with some combination of tactics, luck, and strategy) or, for a riddle, “a solution exists,” which often makes matters much easier as long as it, in fact, does exist.

Here, you’ll find a mix of articles on: the theory of games and how they are similar and different; game design, in the abstract and my specific attempts; reviews and play reports; riddles and puzzles I think are interesting; and other gaming-related topics that interest me. My focus is on card and board games, but occasionally I delve into roleplaying and computer games as well.