Assassins were the theme of Sep’s RPG blog carnival. They were several excellent blog posts about this killer topic: The Assassination Game @ Lungfishopolis – How to do assassins well as PCs or NPCs. My Home Brew Old Hack: What about Assassins? Need them or not? @ The Geek Life Project – Grogtard talks about [...]
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5 Effective Combat Tactics For Assassins
To give you a taste of Assassin’s Amulet, my upcoming new book for game masters, here is a very brief excerpt from the GM Advice chapter. Many GMs struggle with running killer NPCs. One big goal of the book is to arm you with enough actionable advice that you’ll scare the crap out of your [...]
How To Turn A Haunted House Into An NPC
From the GMMastery Yahoo Group A GM asked for help making a haunted house become an interesting NPC. Lots of ideas poured into the thread, which I thought I’d highlight here. I fully support giving locations personality. And as you’ll see below, creative GMs can also make places interactive and dramatic. The Initial Request From [...]
Assassins – September’s RPG Blog Carnival
Assassins are tantalizing. They fill the books and movies we love. They dangle the potential of great gaming in front of our noses. They are this month’s killer RPG Blog Carnival topic. How Do I Participate in the RPG Blog Carnival? To participate in an RPG Blog Carnival, just write a blog post that matches [...]
Writing the Effective Villain
by Ruth D. Kerce A lot has been written about how to develop the hero and heroine in a story. An often overlooked, but equally important character, is the villain. He/She must also be developed properly to make the plot believable. Many of the techniques used to develop other characters will also work in developing [...]
Character and NPC inspiration sources
By Adam, A fan of the blog and news letter, Adam writes in with a great source of inspiration for character and NPC backgrounds. I had a small thought, something I’d like to share. I was listening to a song (Pistolero – by Juno Reactor), it had this great sound bite: “I hate robbing banks”. [...]
How to Handle Pursuit Adventures
I received the following interesting request from a reader about how to handle a campaign where the PCs are the prey. Below is the reader’s request, and then after that I offer some tips. If you have any other tips to add, please add a comment! Hi Johnn, I really enjoy both Roleplaying Tips and [...]
How Do You GM Great Droids?
In RPT #512 RND(axe) asked for help on running interesting droids in his Star Wars game. I received the following two great responses: Keep Droids Tools From Mark of the Pixie When I run droids, I stay focused on their purpose. Droids are tools, not characters (helps stop them outshining PCs). It colours their outlook [...]
1,000 NPC Traits
RPT reader Chad Samuels sent me a spreadsheet of 1,000 NPC traits. A great resource! Thanks Chad. Below are all the traits listed. Just roll d1000. Chad advises picking at least two traits per NPC to add some depth of personality. At the end is Chad’s spreadsheet for download. 1,000 NPC Traits 1 Able 335 Frantic 668 Possessive [...]