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5 Epic Monster Villains From My Campaigns – What Are Yours?

The other day I read a blog about the GM’s Top 10 mastermind monster villains. I love this idea! It’s great inspiration. So today for fun I’m sharing my favourite monster villains with you. The requirements for my list are I can only list monsters I have GM’d or made adventures for. In some cases I […]

How To Become A Better Actor?

A reader sent in this plea for help. Do you have any tips for him? Hi Johnn, In many ways, there is no scope for subtle NPCs in an RPG. I need to portray strong personality traits to ensure these features are made clear to the PCs. Plus, it would help to distinguish my NPCs […]

Assassin Blog Carnival Wrap-Up – September 2011

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 […]

5 Effective Combat Tactics For Assassins — RPT#528

From: Johnn Four 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 […]

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 […]

Cunning Cohorts Build Character: Four GM Tips — RPT#519

An RPT reader asked me for tips about handling followers. This tricky territory is just now emerging in my Riddleport campaign. Following are three tips for getting more mileage out of followers, plus some advice on how to tie followers better into your plots and campaigns. Give Them Family, Friends, Contacts, And Enemies For gameplay, […]

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

Need to spiff up an NPC? Just roll d1000 on the NPC Traits Table below. Thanks to Roleplaying Tips GM Chad Samuels who sent me the initial spreadsheet that sourced this table. A great resource for all GMs! Roll twice and give your NPC: A positive trait A negative, contradictory trait Use the Contradictory Trait […]

Pet & Peer NPCs

by Silveressa Sometimes playing a major NPC that’s part of the party can be tough. After all, it’s hard not to have the NPC come up with a winning strategy, spot a piece of evidence or find a trap the PCs overlooked. However, if one does this too much, the NPC becomes the crutch the group leans […]