In the ongoing debate of killing of PCs and total party kills, one aspect of PC death is often left out: The Plot Kill. Having turned Plot Kills into defining campaign moments and having received some memorable Plot Kills myself, I think the concept warrants discussion.
Pain of Campaigning: Literature and Adventure Planning
Much of gamer culture is shared and it’s not very interesting to rip something off that everyone instantly recognizes and inevitably metagames for. That’s where literature comes in.
Pain of Campaigning: XIX Getting My Hands Dirty
Last week I dealt with brainstorming for my military-based high fatality huge party epic campaign. This week, I’m going to elaborate on a few of the underlying concepts for the campaign. What follows are my preliminary rules/fluff for the game, subject to further consideration and reader feedback.
Pain of Campaigning: Actually Planning
After a long hiatus of actively DMing, I was roused from my gaming slumber. The results are a bit unusual and probably not going to be to everyone’s liking, but after droves and droves of articles detailing how to run games, I figure I’d do an article of my current work in progress: XIX.
Pain of Campaigning VIII: What About the Bad Guys?
Looking at the Campaigning Inquisition, I saw that the vast majority of people favor heroic or at least characters that have the potential to be heroes. Considering the nature of the D&D beast, this makes sense, but I worry that people may be hesitant to try one of the most enjoyable modes of D&D: playing as one of the bad guys.
The Pain of Campaigning III: The Plot Thickens
So, assuming you’ve considered pre-campaign decisions and successfully started your game its now time to keep running a campaign. Not just treading water, but also have it be interesting, engaging, and fun. Maintaining interest, engagement, and enjoyment from all players and a DM can be incredibly difficult, but here are some of the most common […]
The Pain of Campaigning II: Starting the Game
So you have made some decisions about your game. You may have drawn yourself a pretty map, figured out that the King is actually a Beholder, and even made a cute little NPC to travel with the players. If you were really smart you considered the campaign’s primary conflict, means of conflict resolution, and a […]
The Pain of Campaigning I: Story and Pre-Game Decisions
Perhaps the most important decisions in a campaign occurs before the first die is rolled, before there even is a campaign when the would-be Dungeon Master/ Game Master/ Storyteller decides the overall thrust of his story. No, not the nitty-gritty adventure hooks, or the villains, or the individual conflicts, but an overall idea of what […]
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