Hello, nice to meet you!

I'm Ryan J Freeman

Please take a moment to look at my portfolio.

About me

Junior Developer and PM Excited to Exand Skills.

Thanks for taking a look at my portfolio. I am currently a student at KU's Coding Bootcamp, learning the full MERN web stack. I fell in love with Javascript the moment I declared my first variables and called my first function. While I know my way around HTML and CSS, my strengths definitely reside more on the JS side of web development. I currently work as a Project Lead and Support Team Lead at Soleran, Inc. When I complete this Coding Bootcamp, I hope to apply the skills I've learned to do these jobs better.

When I'm not coding or at work, I'm at the table playing board games, tabletop games, or at the park working on my Disc Golf game.

I strongly believe that we produce our best when we are valued, respected, and comfortable. This is why, in the workplace and in life, I strive to treat my team mates with respect and cultivate an environment where all people feel welcome.

Skills

Web Development

  • JavaScript
  • HTML5
  • CSS
  • Node
  • MySQL
  • MongoDB
  • AWS S3 Cloud Storage
  • Firebase

Framework/ Libraries

  • Vue.js
  • React.js
  • Sequelize.js
  • Mongoose.js
  • Passport.js
  • Express.js
  • Bootstrap
  • jQuery
  • Moment.js
  • Popper.js

Project Management

  • Project Owner
  • Scrum Master

Favorite Games

  • Pandemic
  • Azule
  • D&D 5e
  • Gloomhaven
  • Mouse Guard
  • Torchbearer
  • Arkham Horror LCG

Game Design

I started playing board games in college when my roommates brought Settlers of Catan to the dorm. It was the first time I had ever played a board game that wasn't Risk, Monopoly, or Sorry, and my eyes were opened to a world of smart, balanced, and actually fun games. This sparked a life-long passion games that you play with your friends around a table. Since then, I have branched out and come to know and love the many genres and flavors of the bo ard game hobby.

It wasn't until about 2 years ago that I got interested in tabletop Role Playing games. D&D 5e, the back-bone of most fantasy role playing groups, it never quite checked all of my boxes. It doesn't incentivize character development and the mechanics feel both restrictive and vauge at different times. Mouse Guard, on the other hand, has a ton of interesting mechanics, drives players to develop and grow their characters, and portays a beautiful world of little tenacious mice. For all of its positives, it is a hard game to run. Unless your players are seasoned in the Burning Wheel systems, they're going to struggle to understand how to play the game.

Whats a GM to do? Why, hack their own game, of course! Using the Index Card RPG system (a D&D-lite system specifically designed to be hackable), I've started work on a D20 Mouse Guard hack. The goal is to incorporate the player progression, weather, animal nature, and social combat systems of Mouse Guard into a more-familiar D20 system.

ICRPG is the perfect system to incorporate these systems into for several reasons. Neither games have a strick experience point system, and rely more on in-game acheivement for character advancement. ICRPG has outlined a simple character stat block that can be modified and appended without throwing too much off balance. ICRPG's health point system is based off 10-point increment hearts, which lightens the GM's admin and allows them to focus more on the scene. And finally, there is already a tremendous online community of ICRPG hackers to collabrate with!

This project is very much in its infancy, but check back for play testing materials and more soon!

Contact

If you could like to contact me, please fill out the form to the left. I would love to collaborate with other Junior Javascript developers and game designers.

Or, if you like, you can find me on my social media sites below!