Roleplaying Tips Newsletter #344 Holiday Adventures – Entries From The Holiday Contest I recently held a tips contest looking for holidays and holiday encounters GMs could drop into their games. Following are a few of the contest entries. Hopefully one or more of these catch your interest and find a way into your current campaign. […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #345 Hipbone’s Connected To The Thighbone: Scenario and Campaign Arc Construction From Mike Bourke & Blair Ramage Last year I started co-GMing an existing campaign. Initially, I was brought in because I had more experience with the game system, but I soon began assisting in scenario design. As a result, I became […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #346 Hipbone’s Connected To The Thighbone: Scenario and Campaign Arc Construction From Mike Bourke & Blair Ramage Last week, the first half of this article discussed the components of a scenario and some ideas for generating them. This half is about putting them together. Compiling the Plotline By now, you should have […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #347 Unusual Hiding Places Paint It On A Scalp From Aki Halme Hiding places – I wonder what the role of this would have in a story. Puzzle? If so, hiding things well adds to the likelihood they will be missed. Alternatively, it can be a roleplaying element, serving as a plot […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #348 Sneaky Tactics For Weak Monsters Combat encounters are better when you play monsters to the best of their abilities. In numerous books, I’ve read good advice encouraging GMs to play a certain monster with cunning or a certain foe with intelligence. A pet peeve is when that advice isn’t followed up […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #349 Manage NPC Guides Carefully Recently, I received the following reader tips request about NPCs traveling with the party: “I’ve been reading your e-zine for about 3 or 4 months now. I was just wondering if you could put out some tips on the DM playing an NPC that travels with the […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #350 7 Ways To Be A More Entertaining GM Be Enthusiastic Being enthusiastic is a free action. 🙂 It’s also contagious, and players will pick up on your vibe and become enthusiastic themselves. Unless, of course, your enthusiasm stems from a total party kill, in which case your friends might not share […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #351 How To Craft And Use Superstitions To Enhance Your Game From Johnn Four According to Wikipedia, a superstition is the irrational belief that future events are influenced by specific behaviors, without having a causal relationship. In game terms, superstitions are a fun device to add flavour, spawn encounters, and enhance gameplay. […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #352 Know Your Players – Building Your Session Checklist From Johnn Four Checklists are valuable game master tools. They are easy to craft – just brainstorm a list of items, and put them in order, if desired. With each use, you can change and update it until the checklist is complete and […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #353 How To Leave Your Players Hanging – 4 Cliffhanger Tips From Johnn Four Prepare Intercept Encounters If you see the end of the session is near, but it’s too early to trigger your cliffhanger, stall for awhile with an intercept encounter. To do this, have one or more encounters waiting in […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #354 How To Work With Crummy Character Backgrounds 12 Options For Solving “X killed Y” From David R. A common theme with players when asked what their character background is to say that “X killed Y so I hate X.” X is some villainous entity the player is forever hunting, and Y […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #355 11 MORE MONSTROUS TIPS Last July, Roleplaying Tips Weekly ran a contest for monster related tips of all kinds. Subscribers responded with nearly100 entries, and many prizes were handed out. Below are the last, but not least, handful of entries from the contest. May your critters live long and prosper! Even […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #356 Inspiration For Your Games: Superstition Contest Entries Recently, I ran a giveaway where gamers could win a prize for writing in with ideas for in-game superstitions. Here are most of the entries. Hopefully you can use them for ideas and inspiration, in game flavor, plot hooks, and encounter seeds. Thanks again […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #357 9 Spheres Of Influence – My Broad RPG Planning Checklist The following article details a short checklist I use for a lot of things, from planning a new campaign to writing tips to organizing a session. I was using it while writing part two of the Know Your Players tips series […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #358 Know Your Players Part 2 – Create Your Building Checklist In part one; we discussed how important it is to plan with your players in mind, and to build a checklist of in-game preferences and out-of-game habits per player so you have a handy reference. Read part one: http://www.roleplayingtips.com/readissue.php?number=352 This issue […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #359 GM Organization – 5 Tips From Johnn Four Layer Transparencies Over Maps From your school days, do you remember the human body transparencies in the encyclopedia that showed the layers of bones, organs, and muscles? Each transparency was a plastic sheet that had opaque, translucent, and clear parts so that they […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #360 9 Ways To Recruit New Players Finding new gamers and groups can be tricky and is always a hot topic because people move, their game group disintegrates or isn’t a good fit, or they decide to try RPGs again after a long break. A little while ago I received two reader […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #361 Supernatural Weather, Part 1 From Johnn Four This week’s issue is based on a reader request for supernatural weather tips and ideas. Great topic suggestion! I polled the folks on the GM Mastery list, and their great ideas and mine are included below. Thanks to the following for their suggestions and […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #362 Supernatural Weather, Part 2 From Johnn Four Thanks again to the following for their help: Robgonzo, Eric FitzMedrud, Gus, Lorele Phoenixjade, Bobby Nichols, Telas. Here’s a suggestion if you have the time this week. Use the tips in this issue and in part 1 to craft five types of weather events […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #363 It’s About The Character, Not The Player Serving Up Characterization Encounters, Part 1 From Johnn Four Here’s a reader request I received: Could you put some advice in about roleplaying encounters? Specifically, encounters where players can make choices that are equally valid, so they have to think about what their character […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #364 Encounter Tips: Characterization Encounters, Part 2 From Johnn Four This article series is about helping players make in- character decisions, especially in difficult game circumstances. Often called meta-gaming, where players use knowledge their characters wouldn’t have, many GMs wish their players would avoid doing this during sessions. Here’s a reader request […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #365 Craft A Timeline Tool – Prepping A Game World For GMing and Play From Johnn Four Prepare A Global Snapshot If you are like me, you don’t have time to read every page of a world product before putting it into gameplay. My deadline for making Ptolus ready to play is […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #366 Notes to the GM – What a Player Wants From Johnn Four This week’s article is a bit cheeky. They are from a player’s point of view, in the form of notes or requests to the GM. They are actually from myself to myself, and apply equally to players and GMs, […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #367 Craft A World Map – Prepping A Game World For GMing and Play From Johnn Four Four Types Of Maps In general, there are four types of maps in RPGs, which are different from each other in terms of scale and use: World Map The 10,000-foot view of the campaign realm. […]
Continue readingRoleplaying Tips Newsletter #368 Mapping Tips: Planning Your Map Saves Time From Johnn Four RPGs are a do-it-yourself hobby, and one of its treasured activities is making maps. It’s too easy, though, to pick up a pencil and start drawing without thinking. Most botched maps fail for the preventable reasons outlined in this week’s tips. […]
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