Treasure First: A Quick Hack For Creating Adventure Hooks When players fail to trigger an encounter or adventure, our prep becomes moot and the game goes sideways. But how do you craft hooks so appealing that players bite on them harder than an orc at an all-you-can-eat troll BBQ? Earlier this week, I gave a […]
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Here’s how I plot out an old school sandbox in pretty much under a minute. In the Wizard of Adventure members area, we got to chatting about how to use Campaign Logger in conjunction with the The Plot Compass technique. The Plot Compass technique is something I shared with Wizards of Adventure recently. It boils […]
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Effortless & Dynamic Storytelling Among the many tools in my GM Toolbox, the method of Wandering Encounters holds a special place. It’s a simple yet profound way to keep the game world lively, the plot on track, and the characters engaged in evolving story arcs. The core essence of Wandering Encounters lies in its ability […]
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We played another session of the WOIN RPG conversion of my Basilica campaign and it went well. We were running Old School Essentials, and the group opted to try a crunchier system. So far, WOIN is ticking all the boxes. Today’s tip is not about rules though. Instead, it’s about something great one of my […]
Continue readingWhy Your Villains Should Be Making Moves Today’s tip is inspired by a question about villains from RPT GM Gerald Lock. You can catch his full question, his one-shot Halloween adventure, and my video reply here. So, you’ve crafted an awesome villain, complete with a dark past and malevolent goals, but when game night comes […]
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The Golden Trio of Adventure Design RPT GM Benjamin asks: For an anxious and inspiring GM that tried to learn way too much for what is actually needed, how do you just sit down and say, “I’m doing this random plot, with random PCs, and keep everything afloat and fun?” My brother can improvise anything […]
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Mastering the Depths: Enhancing RPG Mines Sometimes, a couple of extra details makes all the difference in helping players imagine our encounters and take interesting actions. RPT GM Chris N. sent me some great insights into the complexities of running a medieval or fantasy RPG mine. We can use these fantastic details to flesh out […]
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A Brief Word From Johnn Before we dig into pacing tips though, a couple of quick items. Get Help With Your Campaign August 26, 2023 – Wizard of Adventure Q&A Zoom. If you are a Wizard of Adventure, here’s details and the link. Feel free to bring questions about your world, campaign, encounters, NPCs, technique, […]
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Did you know there is a Fantasy Grounds version of my complete 1-20th level D&D 5E campaign, The Demonplague, co-written by James Introcaso? I don’t advertise this on The Demonplague’s information page, but will fix that soon. Meantime, if you are a Fantasy Grounds GM, you can purchase the campaign here. Unfortunately, due to Fantasy […]
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A Brief Word From Johnn How have you been doing? We just got back from a crazy camping trip. Mosquitoes, heavy winds, stuff breaking… I also earned a pulled neck muscle, so now I turn my whole body to look around. You could say I’m all-right now. 🙂 While I was killing bugs and cooking […]
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I received this request from a new GM: How do I as a DM keep track of time passage? Suppose the PCs are traveling to a lair and it’s a two-day walk. Should I have them set up camp? What should happen during the camp setup and through the night? How long should I track […]
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A couple of quick action items for you today. 1. Aug 4 – Campaign Logger 101 Webinar – Setting Up Your First Campaign Jochen, the developer of CL, is hosting our very first Campaign Logger webinar. It’s in a Euro-friendly time zone this time. We hope to run more in the future at different times […]
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Ahoi! Before my vacation I released GM Cheat Sheet #08 that I don’t think I announced to you. Check out the Forests 5 Room Dungeon Generator at DriveThruRPG. Have your dice ready to quickly create interesting forest-based 5 Room Dungeons, adventures, and encounters. You can also watch a video walkthrough of the GM Cheat Sheet […]
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It’s great to be back from vacation! Thank you for your patience as I took a couple of weeks off from the newsletter. We went camping near a place called Rocky Mountain House where it’s not rocky and there are no mountains. The picture below was each glorious morning for me. This might leave you […]
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Roleplaying Tips Newsletter #1225 Amp Up Player Engagement With These Rewards Looking for different ways to reward players and their characters? Gold and gems are great, but you can’t dance to them. The best rewards engage characters and players, keep the Infinite Game going via story progression, open up choices and action possibilities, and create […]
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What Makes An Adventure 11/10? In my Master of the 5 Room Dungeon Workshop, I advocate that you can “amp up your adventures to 11.” In other words, we want engaging, challenging, and thrilling adventures our players will love. A workshop member asked me today, “What makes an 11/10 adventure for you?” Great question! Here’s […]
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Streamline Your Gameplay With This Cool House Rule On a podcast with Dr. Keith McNally, Jonathan from Sojourner’s Awake shared his three table rules. And one of them I wanted to forward along to you because it is very good. Here’s a link to the 29 minute podcast on YouTube. Watch My Face Jonathan’s third […]
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Dragon Magazine #139 offered great ways to hide a golem in a room. I love animated objects and golems as monsters. They need no air, water, or food, so make perfect dungeon foes. But if we serve up such obstacles and enemies the same way each time, it gets boring fast. So here are 20 […]
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Today’s tips come in the form of a 13 minute video. When I sent out a recent invitation to my Master of the 5 Room Dungeon Workshop, several GMs responded that they didn’t like the method. Fair enough. There are many ways to craft an adventure! However, some readers mentioned that the five rooms get […]
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How To Keep Story Arcs Alive How do you keep campaign arcs alive? That’s how I’d summarize this tip request I received from Wizard of Adventure Sharon: Our party meets every two or three weeks for a four hour session. With family and life taking center stage between sessions and memories fade, it makes remembering […]
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1d12 Most Common Encounter Mistakes nuqneH TEST! I don’t generally dwell on the negative. We’re here to have fun at every game, after all. However, sometimes it’s great to review a list of gotchas and see if any resonate. If some do, we can then take action to fix. So today I have 1d12 mistakes […]
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You know I’m a huge fan of adventure plot twists. That’s what Room V is all about. But we should try to add encounter-level twists, as well. Then we get to surprise and delight our players several times during sessions! Here is one of my favourite types of twists and d12 examples to help you […]
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Roleplaying Tips Newsletter #1224 We just played session #09 of my Basilica campaign that’s half sandbox, half Temple of Elemental Evil. The party was bequeathed land as reward for escorting settlers safely to the area. As it turns out, the land is a swamp with ruins of an old moathouse on it. Girding loins and […]
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The Swamp Is Calling: d12 Swampy Tips Do you have any upcoming swamp encounters or adventures? To celebrate my newest GM Cheat Sheet for swamps that I released on the weekend ($3 on DTRPG, free to Wizards of Adventure), here are a dozen swampy tips to enhance your campaign. Play Up the Atmosphere Swamps are […]
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Why Players Get Bored With Our GMing (But Might Be Afraid To Tell Us) As a player who gets bored easily (thus I am a forever-GM :), here are three reasons based on my experiences why a GM can lose player attention and participation in a game. Hopefully these tips help keep your table engaged. […]
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