• 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 Roleplaying Games

One Year Later for 4e Podcast

June 10, 2009 by Dave

A whole pile of bloggers and podcasters, including the likes of At-Will, Dungeonmastering, ChattyDM, Gamer’s Haven, Sly Flourish, and yours truly, got together to ask James Wyatt and Chris Perkins of Wizards of the Coast about various topics related to 4e. This all was hosted and put together by Jeff of The Tome Show (who had some questions to ask himself). The end result is quite informative, ranging from game design topics to community topics.

Filed Under: Critical Bits, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, dnd, Dungeons and Dragons, Interviews, one year later, tome show, wizards of the coast

Chatty on 4e: One year later

June 10, 2009 by The Chatty DM

A little more than a year ago, as excitement (and hype) was building around the 4th edition of Dungeons and Dragons, I wrote a series a posts based on what I thought D&D 4e would be about. Nostalgia vs Fun Retro Stupid vs Retro-Stupid I Hearth Grapple Schooled by the Old Combat School Exploration vs […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games

The Dungeon Reality Show: Blood Bowl Edition

June 9, 2009 by The Chatty DM

Over a period of 3 weeks, I wrote a series of post about making one-shot D&D adventures where PCs are drafted into some kind of deadly reality show on the Plane of Games.  The response to the series was very positive so I’m planning to release it as a free PDF in the near future. […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, 4e/Bloodbowl mashup, Dungeon Reality Show

The Dungeon Reality Show, Part 5: The rest!

June 8, 2009 by The Chatty DM

Last time we covered the scene where our brave PC contestants played the first half of a Bloodbowl game. Now it’s time to throw the PCs a curveball… Scene 3 – The Half Time Show Scene goals Perform a Skill challenge that simulates a stage show Introduce combat elements to the challenge if a skill […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, 4e/Bloodbowl mashup, Dungeon Reality Show, Theme week

Friday Chat: Roleplaying with Children

June 5, 2009 by The Chatty DM

On Wednesday afternoon, I found a email by Chris Sims in my inbox.  Chris works for D&D insider but I knew him for having worked on quite a few D&D books, my favorite being the D&D 3.5 Rules Compendium and having briefly chatted with him at Gen Con last year. As I read the email, […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, Friday Chat, gaming with children, Gaming with Kids

The Dungeon Reality Show, Part 4: Let’s Play!

June 3, 2009 by The Chatty DM

Okay so I busted my deadline for posting the whole thing in one week.  However I am going through with the project! Part 1 and part 2 of this series introduced the Dungeon Reality Show. Part 3 was where I started to describe an example of DRS based on Blood Bowl and presented the 1st […]

Filed Under: Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, 4e/Bloodbowl mashup, Dungeon Reality Show, Theme week

The 5×5 Method

June 2, 2009 by Dave

When working on chapter 2 of my D&D 4e campaign (in the paragon tier, chapter 1 having encompassed the heroic tier), I kept running into roadblocks when trying to map out the next major arc. I had left a number of dangling plot threads that didn’t feel right to abandon (that the players were just getting into, as well) so changing gears majorly didn’t seem like the right thing to do. At the same time, I wanted to give the arc a bigger scope than the specific mission-based adventures that I had been sending them on, as well as giving them more freedom to roam about the world I had spent 9 levels introducing them to. I also wanted to let them take more direct control of where they wanted to go next, but still script things out enough to let me plan ahead (i.e. not go full-on sandbox quite yet).

Filed Under: Editorial, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: advice, campaign planning, gamemastering advice

Inq. of the Week: One Year Later for 4e

June 1, 2009 by Dave

Starting with the initial announcement at GenCon 2007, we polled reaction to the coming of a new system and found most to be cautiously optimistic. Then shortly after release, we polled about everyone’s favorite edition of D&D, which at the time showed a preference for 4e, and late voting has only increased that lead. It seems only natural to follow up with the following, after 1 year of release, the question on many minds…

Filed Under: Featured, Inquisition of the Week, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e

Primal/Within Chronicles: Say Yes and have Fun! Part 2

June 1, 2009 by The Chatty DM

See part 1 here. The word of the Spirit After the Ritual was completed and the elemental monsters were vanquished, Dworkin announced that he was now the spokesperson of the Kodiak spirit.  Franky and I had worked out the relationship between his character and the potential spirit beforehand so he explained that from now on, […]

Filed Under: Campaign Logs, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, Chatty's 2008-2009 campaign, Primal/Within, Tropes

Primal/Within Chronicles: Say Yes and have Fun! Part 1

May 31, 2009 by The Chatty DM

Previously in Chatty’s game… Our heroes are hired by a mercenary outfit to protect the lives of four City Within candidate in a one-day campaign/election of the city’s newest burg.  Thought wheeling and dealings, criss-crossed agendas, monsters gone wild and delusional candidates, our heroes are caught in this electoral storm and try their best to […]

Filed Under: Campaign Logs, Musings of the Chatty DM, Roleplaying Games Tagged With: 4e, Chatty's 2008-2009 campaign, Primal/Within

« Previous Page
Next Page »

About the Author

  • Dave

    Dave "The Game" Chalker is the Editor-in-Chief and Co-Founder of Critical Hits. Since 2005, he has been bringing readers game news and advice, as well as editing nearly everything published here. He is the designer of the Origins Award-winning Get Bit!, a freelance designer and developer, son of a science fiction author, and a Master of Arts. He lives in MD with e and at least three dogs.

    Email: dave@critical-hits.com

    Follow me:

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