“How do I get these 13 things I dropped into the game because I thought they’d be fun to now integrate and make sense?” That question came up in July’s GM Q&A call. Gameplay takes us in a direction where we start improvising, and afterwards we’re left with square pegs that need to fit the […]
Continue readingBig Bang Events: How to Create Player-Proof Plots I’m very excited to announce GM’s Log #12 is now available. The topic is a core method I developed in the early 2000s that’s saved my Canadian bacon for over two decades now. A problem that hits my inbox and my coaching sessions on the regular is […]
Continue readingThe gear and equipment tip the other day drew a large response. In the Roleplaying Tips Discord, for example, Game Master Ian offers this idea: re: Double prices then mine their gear. I think a better way is not to change prices but availability. There’s a system in ACKS that restricts the number of items […]
Continue readingHola Game Master! Here’s a callout to a tip buried in the recent How to Make Haggling Fun piece I did: “Players’ Guide price is the floor, street price is double that.” Raise your merchant, equipment, and services prices to give you haggling room and siphon more party treasure. Game Master Rafael sent me a […]
Continue readingJust picked up Level Up by Courtney Campbell. It’s a small book of tables on random topics. And the first table I started reading spawned an article idea. The table is titled “Top Ten Dungeon Resources” and has this description: Well, you’ve got a dungeon. And you’ve got all these factions. Apparently they all live […]
Continue readingOver on ze Discord, Al Dente wants to noodle on mystery resources: Hey! I’m trying to get better at designing mystery scenarios for investigative games like Call of Cthulhu. I was wondering if you guys could suggest any resources i should check out @Loz replied: GURPS Mysteries could be a good source. I remember their […]
Continue readingGame conventions too loud to hear? Old Man Masha asks about this on the Discord: I recently ran a convention with 15 tables. I spaced them so that the chairs would be 4 feet apart after people sat down. But many folks complained about the noise. Can anyone here give me tips on how to […]
Continue readingHow can you get started with D&D 5.5/2024 without spending any gold pieces? New community member GW asks: Hi everyone. I learned about DnD but thought it was going to be too hard way back in about 8th grade, so that was like 1989. The books and the rules were very different than they are […]
Continue readingMy friend in high school tricked me one time. He was GMing me 1:1 in a new campaign. I was following a Kenku. We played for an hour and he described the desert. And nothing happened. Just following the kenku. So, finally, I say something along the lines of, “This is boring.” My friend cracked […]
Continue reading“I despise haggling. I’d much rather have a bot handle it.” – A GM on the RPT Discord I hear that. Yelling numbers at players isn’t fun. I’m not sure when, but I stopped haggling for transaction purposes. Now my merchants want information instead of gold. It’s partly how I make villains seem three steps […]
Continue readingThe Tiny Prep group hit a milestone the other day. We’ve got a streak going of 150 consecutive days! Congrats to the GMs getting their campaigns ready for next session, five minutes at a time. Speaking of Tiny Prep, I saw this question on the Discord from Game Master EwokTaintPuncher (ahem): Doc recently told me […]
Continue readingUse the Beaufort Scale to help make wind and storm rulings easier. I grew up on a street called Beaufort Avenue. When we moved there, it had no curbs or sidewalks. And it dead-ended a few blocks down the road. And we had some fantastic wind storms. The walnut tree became weather’s weapon during gales. […]
Continue readingHola Game Master! GM’s Log #9: How to Build Legendary Magic Items was just published, and it cloaks my atomic unit of prep in the guise of juicy loot. What started as a quick way to outline NPCs in the 2010s has become my universal GM tool for instantiating any kind of game piece: NPCs, […]
Continue reading
So I’m a cheap bastard. That’s number ten on The Gamemaster’s Hall Of Shame: Monty Haul’s Top Ten Cousins all the way back to Roleplaying Tips Newsletter #3: 10 Minnie Haul Players in previous campaigns joke about it. I like to pretend there’s no treasure chapter at all. Mice must’ve eaten those pages. But the […]
Continue reading
Happy Canada Day! While swatting mosquitoes and sipping cool bevvies, let’s look at a dilemma that community member Sir Tainley poses about explaining the strength of commoners in certain game systems: I’m designing a world for a D&D 5e clone. I want magic to be reasonably common, and taught in the universities. But, powerful enough spells […]
Continue reading
On the Roleplaying Tips Discord, @Kodia Tomekeeper reminded me about the fantastic template Pixar used for story spines. It works well for our own adventure, campaign, and even world seeds: Once upon a time there was ___. Every day, ___. One day ___. Because of that, ___. Because of that, ___. Until finally ___. Let’s […]
Continue reading
Here’s a tip for new GMs or those new to point crawls. What’s a point crawl? I don’t know the official definition, but mine is an adventure you make based on story gates characters must get through. When the final obstacle’s been beaten and that gate traversed, the party’s won. Creating a point crawl confused […]
Continue reading
GM’s Log #7 went out to CampaignCraft members yesterday, and it teaches my 5 Actions Framework that anticipates 90% of encounter derailments and broken adventures. After you complete the tutorial’s six steps, players can still surprise you, but they’re much less likely to break your encounters. One of my favourite examples of players ruining my […]
Continue reading
Happy Monday, Game Master! Friday’s tip about using flashbacks for backstories garnered a great response from the community. You sent in several fantastic ideas on how to take this mechanic even further. Today, let’s look at a great breakdown from GM Allen (pictured here with his Magic 8 Ball USB button) on how to use […]
Continue reading
The first time I encountered a flashback mechanic was at Intrigue Con here in town in a Night’s Black Agents game. The second time was the following morning playing Blades in the Dark. The cool thing about flashbacks is you can add them to any game system. I’m doing it right now for my Lost […]
Continue reading
A Brief Word From Johnn Hola Game Master! First, a quick note to say that yesterday I fixed the broken video links in the 7-Day GM Organization Challenge. To get the fresh links, you can re-join the challenge or feel free to email me and I will send you the link list directly. Today’s tip […]
Continue reading
A quick trick to make melees more exciting from this week’s GM’s Log. Ankhegs are one of my favourite monsters. Looking at their stat block, they’re a one-trick pony. Just a brute that deals damage. But their strategy involves verticality, making the critter agile, reusable, and always a challenge. Ankhegs burrow, but most characters cannot. […]
Continue reading
Instinct vs. Prep. A GM in our community recently shared a struggle many of us face: “I generate NPC actions by zen and instinct, but eventually there are too many pieces to track. My notes become random, unactionable noise, and the prep becomes an exponential amount of work. How do I stop my campaign from […]
Continue reading
Read Time: 3 Minutes What’s one thing I do to make every encounter better? This morning I was drafting up a document explaining my CampaignCraft membership program, and I got to writing about my core GMing philosophy of encounters being the atomic unit of gameplay. Players judge our campaigns by how they feel last session […]
Continue reading
A 1-Minute Read My game on Sunday proved to me again why a bit of combat prep matters. One encounter featured a collapsing bridge, tricky terrain with barnacles and kelp, and a channel with strong tidal water. The other encounter offered only minimal terrain and lacked interesting routes, positions, and discoveries. Guess which one turned […]
Continue reading