• Critical-Hits Studios
    • Criminals Card Game
    • Sentinel Comics: the Roleplaying Game
  • Downloads & Tools
    • Critical Hits Fantasy Name Generator
    • Drinking D&D 2010
    • Drinking D&D 2011
    • Fiasco Playset: “Alma Monster”
    • MODOK’s 11 for Marvel Heroic Roleplaying
    • Refuge In Audacity RPG
    • Strange New Worlds RPG
  • Guides
    • Gamma World
    • Guide to 4e Accessories
    • Guide to Gaming DVDs
    • Skill Challenges
  • RSS Feed
  • Facebook
  • Twitter

Critical Hits

Everything tabletop gaming since 2005

  • News
  • Reviews
  • Columns
    • Dire Flailings
    • Dungeonomics
    • Musings of the Chatty DM
    • Pain of Publication
    • The Architect DM
  • Podcasts
    • Critical Hits Podcast
    • Dungeon Master Guys Podcast
  • Roleplaying Games
  • Tabletop Games
  • Game Hacks & Content
  • Video Games
You are here: Home / Archives for The Chatty DM

Mini-Trope: The Bad, The Killer and the Evil.

November 22, 2007 by The Chatty DM

So far I have been doing a lot of posts about DMing tropes, but what about tropes on DMing? (This post is very satirical. If anyone is offended by this… well let’s just say I’d rather not play in your game…) When you ask RPG-savvy people to describe a cliché (or a trope) about DMs, […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games, Tropes Tagged With: DMing, mini-post, Tropes

DM Chronicles, Session 6: Perfectly Paced Action Crunch! (Part 2)

November 21, 2007 by The Chatty DM

Image Source: Monster Manual IV, Wizards of the Coast, Artist: Jim Nelson In which ChattyDM’s players find all kinds of trouble and manage to always come out on top. See part 1 here. The players entered deeper in the tomb’s second level, finding themselves in a large “T” shaped room. It featured 2 more stone-doors-with-levers […]

Filed Under: Campaign Logs, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 3.5e, Chatty's 2007-2008 campaign, DMing

Micro-Crunch: I knew Mike Mearls was a Crunch Overlord!

November 21, 2007 by The Chatty DM

As you may know, Martin Rayla of Treasure Table is taking a well deserved month off from writing his daily blog. He’s now slaving away doing NaNoWriMo, writing about whatever it is DMs write about (I suspect Ninjas and Pirates, but that’s just me). During that time he’s reposting some of his best stuff from […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Crunch, mini-post

DM Chronicles, Session 6: Perfectly Paced Action Crunch! (Part 1)

November 20, 2007 by The Chatty DM

Previously in Phil’s game: The heroes struck a deal with the Keepers of the Veil to investigate where the plant-like humanoids, created by the drug Green Welcome, were headed in Ptolus’ Necropolis. Said plant-like beings, called Children of Sehan, were tracked to an ancient funeral mound and engaged. Two were slain, diffcultly, one remains, inside […]

Filed Under: Campaign Logs, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 3.5e, Chatty's 2007-2008 campaign, DMing

A fey's journal: Under Ptolus' Necropolis (estimated time: noon)

November 20, 2007 by The Chatty DM

Image Source: Art from Song of Serenity (Magic the Gathering, Exodus, Wizards of the Coast), Copyright 2005 Tony DiTerlizzi (Check his site!), used with the artists’ permission. Here is Yan’s latest player log detailing last Friday’s tomb crawling. Enjoy! I take a few minutes to write this as we are discussing our next course of […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Player Log

Adventure Prep: My Recent Time Management Shortcuts

November 18, 2007 by The Chatty DM

Now that I made a point about the value of our player’s free time, I must confess that I don’t have that more free time than them. Ronin and Ve4grm have made good argument that the DM’s fun factor must also be taken into account and does not want to waste his/her own free time […]

Filed Under: Adventure Prep, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: DMing, mini-post

The special challenge of DMing for adult gamers

November 18, 2007 by The Chatty DM

There is quite an interesting discussion going on over the Okay…your Turn RPG forums (a very classy, mostly D&D/Iron Heroes/Arcana Evolved/ Ptolus gaming forum) about the Dungeon Masters having become the Dungeon Servants. This discussion brought me additional insights about a subject that has been brewing in my mind for some time now. You see, […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Player Psychology, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: DMing, Tropes

Ahhhhh, now everything seems to work just fine.

November 17, 2007 by The Chatty DM

We had a great crunchy game last night… with lot’s of laughs and a lot of Flight of the Conchords videos during dinner… (Sorry embeding a YouTube Video seems to break the page… to be checked) As you can see, I switched themes to a darker, less colorful one than the Sci-Fi theme. (To be […]

Filed Under: Geek Stuff, Musings of the Chatty DM

Call to all minions!

November 16, 2007 by The Chatty DM

It’s been while since I made a Crunch Overlord post (I can already hear Yan groan). But as I did last time I’ll actually add some usefull RPG table psychology stuff. Its also a community thing, I hope you won’t be too offended if I call you minions… 🙂 Also just so were all on […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Player Psychology Tagged With: Community

Mini-Crunch: The Golem's Magical Immunities

November 15, 2007 by The Chatty DM

When Grandaddy Gygax created the various types of Golem (borrowed from Jewish folklore I believe… Yup that’s right), I think he was aiming at a Monster that would be hard to deal with at High Level and that would allow Fighters and other non-spell casters a chance to shine with their +3 weapons. That concept […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Crunch, mini-post

« Previous Page
Next Page »

About the Author

  • The Chatty DM

    The Chatty DM is the "nom de plume" of gamer geek Philippe-Antoine Menard. He has been a GM for over 40 years. An award-winning RPG blogger, game designer, and scriptwriter at Ubisoft. He squats a corner of Critical Hits he affectionately calls "Musings of the Chatty DM." (Email Phil or follow him on Twitter.)

    Email: chattydm@critical-hits.comWeb: https://critical-hits.com//category/chattydm/

Subscribe

RSS Feed

Archives

CC License

All articles and comments posted posted on the site (but not the products for sale) are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. References to trademarks and copywritten material are included for review and commentary use only and are not intended as any kind of challenge.

Recent Comments

  • fogus: The best things and stuff of 2024 on Remembering the Master: An Inelegant Eulogy for Kory Heath
  • Routinely Itemised: RPGs #145 on Review: The Magus
  • The Chatty DM on Review: The Magus
  • Linnaeus on Review: The Magus
  • 13th Age: Indexing Truths — Critical Hits on The Horizon Conspiracy

Contact The Staff

Critical Hits staff can be reached via the contact information on their individual staff pages and in their articles. If you want to reach our senior staff, email staff @ critical-hits.com. We get sent a lot of email, so we can't promise we'll be able to respond to everything.

Recent Posts

  • Remembering the Master: An Inelegant Eulogy for Kory Heath
  • Review: The Magus
  • Hope in the Dark Heart of Evil is Not a Plan
  • Chatty on Games #1: Dorf Romantik
  • The Infinity Current: Adventure 0

Top Posts & Pages

  • Home
  • The 5x5 Method Compendium
  • Dungeons & Dragons "Monster Manual" Preview: The Bulette!
  • Critical Hits Fantasy Name Generator
  • On Mid-Medieval Economics, Murder Hoboing and 100gp
  • "The Eversink Post Office" - An Unofficial Supplement for Swords of the Serpentine
  • Finally a manual for the rest of them!
  • Dave Chalker AKA Dave The Game
  • How to Compare Birds to Fish
  • The Incense War: a Story of Price Discovery, Mayhem, and Lust

Copyright © 2026 · News Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in