Emily Care Boss

Emily Care Boss is an Indie roleplaying game designer, theorist and publisher. She was a foundational member of The Forge, an early leader in the Indie role-playing game movement and is considered the creator of the American Freeform genre of roleplaying games, which combine indie RPG principles and mechanics with Nordic freeform and American chamber larp techniques. Her game, Under My Skin was winner of the Audience Choice Award at Fastaval 2009.
Career
Boss and fellow Forge theorist Vincent Baker are co-credited with formulating the Lumpley Principle (a.k.a. Baker-Care or Baker-Boss Principle), which states, "System (including but not limited to 'the rules') is defined as the means by which the group agrees to imagined events during play." Further development of the Lumpley Principle describes player contributions as being assigned credibility by the other players in the game.
In addition to her design work, Boss is the founding owner of Black & Green Games. She was a contributor to the role playing journals Push, Playground Worlds, the Knutepunkt publication States of Play, and the companion publications for WyrdCon in 2012 and 2013. She organized the JiffyCon series of indie roleplaying game mini-conventions in Massachusetts. Many of her games have been noted as being adept at handling narratives of romance and sex and Boss has been outspoken about the handling of love and sex in the design of rpgs and larps.
From 2005-2009 she co-wrote an RPG theory and design blog Fair Game, with fellow designer Meguey Baker.
Personal life
Boss graduated from University of Massachusetts Amherst with a bachelors degree in Social Thought and Political Economy and masters degree in Forestry. Boss currently resides in Plainfield Massachusetts and is married to fellow game designer, Epidiah Ravachol. She is currently a forestry consultant in the woodlands of western Massachusetts.
Roleplaying Bibliogrphy
*Breaking the Ice: A Game about Love, for Two, nominated for three Indie Game Awards in 2005, including Game of the year.
*Heart of the Rose, 2007
*Shooting the Moon: All is Fair in Love and War 2008
*The Colour Game, Tiny Tales of Romance, 2008
*Sign in Stranger 2009
*Under My Skin: Who do You Love?, Winner of the Fastaval 2009 Player's Choice award.
*Dread House, a boardgame for children and adults, 2010.
*MonkeyDome, 2010
*Playing With Intent, a system to bstructure freeform games, 2012
*Misericord(e), 2013
*Remodel, an American Freeform game about women's experience in mid-life, 2013
*Blood on the Snow collaborator including a live action system for Robin Laws's DramaSystem Hillfolk, 2013
*Girls Elswehere collaborator, a supplement for Josh Jordan's game Heroine, 2013
*King Wen's Tower, premièred at Fastaval 2014
Honours and Awards
* Guest of Honour at Ropecon 2007
* Guest of Honour at Fastaval 2009
* Winner of Fastaval 2009 Audience Choice (Under My Skin)

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu