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You are here: Home / Archives for guest

The Inner Half-Orc versus The Retro-Clone

September 1, 2009 by guest

(PM is a good friend of mine and while our interest in gaming and movies intersect, we have not roleplayed all that often together.  Here’s one of his rare, and always very entertaining posts about his experience as a closet RPG geek -ChattyDM) Where is it? I’m sure it was around here somewhere… I hear […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Player Psychology, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: S&W, The Closet Half Orc

I Didn’t Know You Could Do That in 4e – Social Combat -or- Making Charisma the Overpowered Attribute for Once

August 14, 2009 by guest

So. You’ve seen movies or comic books where people can use their words as a tangible means to fight. You’ve been impressed by witty insults in swordfights, fierce battle cries, and people who use words to defend themselves with more than a snippy comeback.And you’ve thought to yourself, “Self, wouldn’t it be badass to be able to do that in a role-playing game?”.
Well, I believe it not only to be possible – but easily done in a variety of handily house-rulable forms. And not just the charismatic few who use as verbal buffs in combat to help allies or intimidate enemies – but that any characters can use a well-placed jibe to throw an opponent. Elan would be proud.

Filed Under: Game Hacks & Content, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, advice, Social powers

Adventurers Anonymous

August 12, 2009 by guest

Storyteller is the author of the RPG blog Beneath the Screen, and a content developer for Nevermet Press. He is proud to be back at ChattyDM’s blog for the one-year anniversary of his first guest post ever on the blogosphere, which he wrote for ChattyDM last year. Without further ado, onward with the guest post! […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: advice, DMing, world building

Minimum Session Prep: Listen

August 11, 2009 by guest

Hi, I’m Brent P. Newhall, and I feel bad about this post.  I originally promised Chatty a post aimed at newbie DMs, describing the absolute minimum prep needed for a D&D 4th Edition session.  And while I’ll cover that, I realized there’s a bigger issue that needs to be addressed. The amount of preparation required […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, advice

Dude, You Gotta Try Mutant Future!

August 10, 2009 by guest

WalkerP is the co-host and producer of The RPG Haven Podcast. Check out the latest episode on how to enjoy GenCon when you can’t actually go. I would like to thank ChattyDM for giving me this opportunity to share my love for Mutant Future with you. I think it’s great that he is having guest posters […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Guest Post, Mutant Future

Silly DM, minor quests are for players

August 5, 2009 by guest

About a year ago, I read a post about sharing narrative control with players over on Gnome Stew that just blew my mind. After my initial reaction of “Are you kidding me? The DM is the narrator, end of story,” I realized that I already did some narrative sharing because I encouraged the players to […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, Dungeons and Dragons, major quests, minor quests, narrative control, player narrative

But my father was a blacksmith! – Crafting in 4E

August 4, 2009 by guest

Hi there.  My name is Rob, a.k.a. “A Hero”, from A Hero Twice A Month.  While I can be a chatty DM at times, I am not the ChattyDM.  Still, he was nice enough to let me post my thoughts about crafting items while he is off on his GenCon hiatus. When the game designers […]

Filed Under: Game Hacks & Content, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, advice

I Didn’t Know You Could Do That With 4E: Adventure-Length Effects

July 31, 2009 by guest

Hey everybody!  My name is Brad Gardner.  I’m a long time D&D player.  Currently I’m DMing a game for some friends (The “Savage Tide” adventure path, converted to 4E) as well as writing for the RPGA’s Living Forgotten Realms campaign.  As of GenCon 2009, I’ll have the privilege of having five adventures published for the […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games

For new GMs: Worldbuilding is storytelling: complication, complexity, micronarratives, and your precious little fantasy world-baby

July 30, 2009 by guest

It’s the autism-spectrum version of playing god: surveying charts and tables and lists and believing, for just a moment, that a world can be contained in such a form. Elves and dragons are less unbelievable than that power fantasy.

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: advice, world building

Dude, You Gotta Try Savage Worlds!

July 29, 2009 by guest

Wrath of Zombies is a recent Blogger.  You can follow his RPG antics over at his blog. Wow.  I feel all sorts of special getting to fill in for Chatty today!  Honestly, for a new blogger like me, these are big shoes to fill but I’ll try not to disappoint! I, ironically at the same […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: Guest Post, Savage Worlds

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