Johnn's Games Archives - Roleplaying Tips

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A Big Surprise From Session 0 Yesterday

The fighter awoke on flat, wet, cold rock, his face in a puddle of something warm and sticky. His eyes immediately fixated on a tipped, flickering lantern leaking oil right toward him. Thus began my Lost Isle campaign, an homage to The Isle of Dread and the TV show Lost. We started In Medias Res. […]

Reducing GM Pressure: Phase In Your Jobs

Reducing GM Pressure: One Thing Added, One Removed Go easy on yourself. And keep it simple behind the screen. I ran Night’s Black Agents for the first time on Sunday. We did the chase scene with the nuclear briefcase. Great game. Tricked my players to play again in March. The PCs are super agents. The […]

In A TPK They Can’t Hear You Screen

To screen or not to screen, that is the question from Roleplaying Tips GM Eli: Johnn! Thank you for these wonderful articles. I was wondering, could you tell me why you do or do not use a DM screen? I’m interested to hear what you think! Thanks Eli. I stopped using a GM screen in […]

Daggerheart + World Ripples

Hei Game Master. And happy New Year. On Sunday I got to play in a Daggerheart one-shot run by @mungo9494. Great session. Fun system too, though I need to lean more into the Hope mechanics next time. The GM did something at the end that I liked a lot. And I’m now noodling on how […]

Organizing My Classic Adventures

Still downsizing. And this weekend I tackled my classic D&D adventures shelf. In the photo above, from top left, clockwise: What was the purpose of my quest? I have a few goals here. First, I’ve been in an 80s nostalgia phase of late. Just watched Predator again. Fantastic. Now watching Tron. Also killer. So I […]

Kilgon the Sharpshooter (Playing Online Without a VTT)

Yesterday, we played Stars Without Number. D&D meets classic scifi. A nice and simple old school approach that leaves lots of room for roleplay and creativity. We had players in Canada, U.S., and Germany. We used Zoom with a whiteboard, and our Dice Service that Wizards of Adventure have access to. I also used Freebooter […]

Battle of the Organs: The Gallbladder Strikes Back

I was working on a campaign faction last night called The Choir and my wife gave me a gruesome idea. But the idea didn’t mesh with what I had in mind for The Choir, so I used it to homebrew a horrific monster instead. Choir Culture: Death, Music, and Bone Organs The Choir ruled as […]

How I Run One-Shots (Great For Convention Games Too)

How much should you cover before and in the first session so new players feel ready and excited – but not buried under rules? Wizard of Adventure L asks: I’m looking for practical thoughts on how to run a Session 0 (or 0.5) that helps brand new players feel comfortable with the rules – without […]

My Weird d20 Ritual

I recently traded emails with a GM where we were talking about rolling dice, and this reminded me about a time in high school when I stole a fellow player’s d20. High crime indeed! We were playing C3 The Lost Island of Castanamir. A guy named Jamie was GMing. And I quite liked another player’s […]

Crunchy Mechanics and Rich Lore: My Journey into The Dark Eye

(Success generally means the story goes in the direction the hero intends, while failure works against the hero’s efforts.) I played The Dark Eye a couple of weeks ago. It’s a crunchy, old-school game with a relatively recent new edition. I’m especially enjoying the game’s lore. Its European sources are fresh to me like The […]

5 Tips for Converting Rules to a Different Game System Mid-Campaign

On Tuesday, I got an interesting mechanics question from Roleplaying Tips GM Ajax: Thanks for the heads up on Blackbirds RPG. I have been slowly getting Zweihander supplements, either to run with the core rules or hack for use with other Fantasy RPGs. I’m curious, have you ever written an article on using one RPG […]

Evolving Hex Crawls: My New Approach Where Sandbox Meets Hex Crawl

You know how my preferred campaign design approach is Sandbox meets Crawling meets Adventure Path? I wrote on that recently here. Well, over the weekend I tweaked it a bit. On the surface, it’s just wordplay. But to me, it’s an exciting change in how I do things behind the screen. First let’s review. My […]

The Riches of World-Building: Spending Party Treasure

A 5E GM expressed frustration to me over the limited ways in which players can spend their loot: The only issue with treasure as plot devices, and I already see it within the game. There isn’t anything to buy with the gold and riches you reward. In 5E, magic isn’t supposed to be bought and […]

He Rode In On A T-Rex And Got Buried

Murder Hobos assembled once more Friday night and the session started with a bang (literally) and ended on a very interesting note.

My Experience on The Picture Side of The Screen: 6 Tips for Players

From Johnn Four Roleplaying Tips Newsletter #0187 A Brief Word From Johnn Posting Full “From” Names Since the ezine’s inception in 1999, I’ve always posted Reader’s Tips “from” name as full first name and last name’s initial. Unless anyone objects, I’m switching to full name because I feel tips submitters will get a little more […]