Bradford Allen recently wrote a very popular article for RPT called How to Create Blockbuster Box Office Hits with Your Players – Every Adventure. He advised to present your group a serious setback at the 75% mark of an adventure. This provides perfect pacing to create maximum tension. Will this be the defeat of the [...]
Archive | August, 2011
Crimson Dawn Adventure Synopsis #16
by Silveressa This synopsis is the beginning of the second installment of my Darkest of Winters campaign, under the new name “Crimson Dawn.” Now summer is drawing to a close and free time is more abundant I’ll be resuming my campaign synopsis updates on bi-weekly basis, and will return to a weekly basis as fall [...]
As Time Passes – How to Game in Micro, Macro and Epic Time
A reader at CampaignMastery.com posed this tricky question to Mike Bourke and me: My campaign recounts the development of a world in constant change. But because things like cities being built, Empires going to war and technologies being developed do not take place within mere days or weeks, I feel it’s only logical for years [...]
Fear in RPGs
by Delphine T. Lynx Fear. One of our strongest emotions, and yet one very difficult to conjure up unless it’s genuine. It can be fleeting or eternal, gentle or monstrous. But how does Fear apply to RPGs? It is important to note that not every roleplaying game would benefit from a sense of impending doom, [...]
Adventure Design Tip: How Do You use Chekhov’s Gun in Gaming?
From Ben Scerri The literary principal of Chekhov’s Gun has been around since the late 19th century and has influenced every aspect of storytelling culture. However, in my experience, it has failed to fully affect gaming and the stories game masters tell. This might be due to the reactive essence of good gaming (i.e. the [...]
GM Tip Request – How Do You Track All the Details of a Living World?
O Wise Sage of the Northern Hemisphere, I come to you with an all-consuming question and have emptied my cup and am eager to learn. There’s a world that’s been created and lovingly populated with all manner of things. There are continents with plate tectonics and zones of subduction and hotspots and rift valleys. There [...]
What is a Campaign?
In RPT#519 Cunning Cohorts Build Character: Four GM Tips I pondered about what a campaign actually is. I see the term used ubiquitously, and the RPG community seems to know what’s being talking about when someone uses the word. However, as I thought about a definition, I realized there are many variances and parts tricky [...]