Missed the start of this during a crazy Monday, so here's a couple answers.
August 1: Do you prefer to use real dice, a dice application or program, or use a diceless system?
I prefer to roll real dice, at a table, but these days playing online via Hangouts and/or Roll20 is so much more achievable on a regular basis, so in terms of simple volume of rolls, recent data indicate "virtual dice" (I happily pay a monthly subscription to Roll20 to support their service, and it's worth every penny.)
August 2: What is the best game session you have had since August 2015?
This one: https://youtu.be/mz7f6RFBdKQ
My favorite line is right around 2 hours, 27 minutes, when Mike sighs, closes his eyes, and says "I really hate this place. I hate this place so bad," about the creepy cabin.
I really need to run more *World games. It just suits my GMing style right down to the ground; it's like running Amber Diceless, but with dice, in a weird way.
Talking about Amber… do you still play? I miss my Amber sessions, they were among the best/deepest/most fun I've ever had. Great game, great novels.
I don't still play – haven't in quite a long time, mostly because the diceless system left me frustrated after a (long) while.
Dungeon World (and most of the other PtbA games) really feel like that kind of gaming, but get rid of 'just talk your GM into it' fiat system with the dice mechanics that do two really good and useful things: 1) get rid of the fiat aspect and (2) inject unexpected results and interesting conflicts into situations that otherwise would have remained pretty predictable.
I do a lot of games where wide open narration is present, but that can wear you out after while, so something like this, that asks for something inventive but in a constrained scope, really keeps me going, without wearing me out.
Thank you, Doyce. You kind of mirror my emotions here. I miss the feeling of those Amber sessions, but I can't seem to recapture it with the diceless system. I wouldn't want to play Amber with anything but diceless, though.
Ever since I started rolling dice again (years and years ago), it just feels right (and I love dice!).
The only thing I get hung up on occasionally is the GM-does-not-roll-dice aspect. I still have the feeling, on and off, that I should roll dice, too. Strange, especially because all of our pbtA games (and pbtA-likes) were smooth and fun.
I've been thinking about "the GM doesn't roll doesn't roll dice", because it doesn't bother me really, and I wondered why.
Bottom line, I think it goes back to running Amber for SO long, and really a lot of other games – the players come of with an idea, I figure out how it works in the system, and then they roll (or just play forward, in Amber)… that's always KIND of been what happened anyway, so I guess I didn't roll much in other games anyway.
I mean, in DnD, I'd roll to-hits on monsters and then the damage or whatever, but I don't know that I ever did secret GM rolling of player skills or whatever.
Anyway, point is, most everything that happens is (Situation + Player Idea + GM Input + Player Roll) anyway, so Dungeon World didn't mess me up too badly in that regard.
I still roll monster-dealt damage in DW, though, just for the heck of it – but the rolls that cause the damage to happen are all the players'/hard moves.
Heck, I like that – it's so streamlined. 🙂
It kind of takes a lot of stuff off of the GM's shoulder. And that feels liberating. 🙂