World building can be one of the most intimidating tasks for DMs and GMs when it comes to running their own RPG campaign. No matter how much advice you read or receive from your friends, creating a world of your own or modifying someone else’s world can still feel incredibly daunting even for people who are experienced at running their own games. In my last solicitation for questions and suggestions to discuss in this series on twitter, clampclontoller said this, “In my homebrew, creating histories in specific territories is a challenge – particularly linking them to the whole world.” Since this is an issue that I’ve struggled with many times myself, it feels like a good topic worth exploring here!
Proper Villainy: The Crockpot Of The Damned
This week we discuss some good practical evil you can do in your own backyard. Proper villains use fear, uncertainty, and doubt to ply their dark craft and cement their power over the helpless. Learn from the dark example of the mac daddy of interstellar villainy, Lord Vader. Dude can make a serious bowl of evil gumbo.
Playing Leverage with Just the FAQs
Leverage: the Roleplaying Game does so many things right. It’s quick, collaborative, easy to prep, iconic, and tethered to a great back-and-forth mechanic and play style. But still, every plan has room for improvement.
The Plastic Is Too Damn High: Miniatures Pricing Primer
Like many of you, I was dismayed at the cancellation of the D&D minis line. Understandably, this raised some questions among the community. “Are minis really that expensive to make?” “Why can’t I just buy a box of assorted monsters?” “Isn’t it stupid to reuse sculpts?” I hope to be able to answer some of these questions, with what limited knowledge I have about the situation.
Boardgaming Resurgence
Just over a year ago our group of friends was heavily into the deck building game Dominion. It was relatively new but had been out long enough to have three quick expansions and we really couldn’t get enough of it. Some days we would play game after game for hours on end. As should be expected, we eventually burned out from that pace. Thankfully, over the last two months I have noticed an extreme increase in the amount of board games that my friends and I have been playing and I want to share a few of the stand out games we’ve been enjoying.
Proper Villainy
Villains add a great element to a campaign: an opposing force that the players can invest themselves in fighting against. But what exactly makes a good villain? Let’s take a little trip down a road paved with good intentions.
The Architect DM: Traps, Hazards, & Terrain
Once again I solicited on my twitter account (@Bartoneus) asking what aspects of location design in RPGs people have problems with, and I’d like to thank everyone that responded this afternoon. I will be addressing many of the topics you guys asked about in the future, but for today’s post I chose DigitalDraco’s comment: “I always want to include more interesting terrain effects, hazards & the like but they tend to seem added-on.” This topic immediately struck me as one that I’ve struggled with in the past and one that I believe many other people have had issues with as well.
It’s Got Electrolytes
One problem I keep running into with my campaign is that I have tunnel vision. I see the story, I see the characters, I see the players, and I have a tendency not to think about the existence of other things without some effort. One major side effect of this is that we’re 5 sessions in and nobody has received any loot. We also don’t use XP in my campaign. I think my players are getting antsy. I’m worried they might snap and hold me for ransom if I don’t figure out how to reward them somehow. If I suddenly stop tweeting one day, don’t wait. Call the cops.
Chatty’s Adventure Scaffold #1 : Words with Fiends
Where Chatty makes his triumphant return by being all cryptic about what he did these last few weeks. At least, you’ll get a cool adventure plan for your reading troubles.
The Creme Filling Of The DM Soul
In which I ignore good advice, accept better advice, accidentally stumble into great adventure, and achieve my heart’s desire. If you’re a cinnamon roll aficionado and this is making you hungry, then this post is probably going to disappoint. Only I can eat my words. Shame they don’t taste like cinnamon rolls.
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