They Just Won’t Give Up!

Yesterday, I talked about my adventures with surrendering as a player character. I’ve noticed that my sort of strategy is rare, though. In most game groups, one can certainly try to arrange a surrender, but it̵[...]
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Adventures in Surrendering

“I don’t lose. I just change the battlefield to something that suits my skills a bit more.” –Tuyet There’s one thing I noticed about two of the games I was in (one running, one playing) that differ[...]
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Spark of Fae: Pre-Session

Well, I've decided that the recaps will be best served to go on Tuesdays. I'll have some time after the session to wrap things together, especially seeing as how I tend to find sociable things to do on Saturdays and what[...]
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The Narrative Uses of Broken Things

The shards of a pot on the floor. Bits of an ancient item scattered as plot coupons all over the world. The greatest crafter in the world carefully trying to restore the function of something that hasn’t worked in [...]
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Every Book’s a Sourcebook: Worlds of the Imperium

Recently I was reading a blog by the name ‘Blog of Holding’ and read this post. In summary he thinks that every book has roleplaying ideas in it, just waiting to be unlocked. I think this is an excellent idea[...]
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Some Ending Considerations

After days, weeks, months, years or whatever, it’s over (or at least, it’s about to be and you’re just settling down to the resolution). The major antagonist is out, the country has been liberated, the [...]
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Threads of Sanity #1

Our Forgotten Realms campaign kicked of this Saturday with classic action in the realms. It has been over four months since I have had opportunity to have some fun around the table. Teaching new players to play forced me[...]
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Magical Location Design: Ravyn’s Guide to Geomancy

In yesterday’s post about creating magical locations based on their purpose, I mentioned the possibility of the purpose being to channel magic, and said I’d discuss it later. “The following day” counts as[...]
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Magical Location Design: To Every Place, a Purpose

One of the most common first approaches I see for designing a magical location is determining its purpose. Sometimes, it’s to channel magic in a certain way, but that’s less common and not necessarily likely [...]
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Not Without My Beholder: A Mother’s Tale

I've spent the majority of my blogging career trying to figure out how to roleplay better. To get them emotionally invested in their characters. To make them feel and act as their character might. To dance into the dange[...]
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Anticipation in the Air!

I mentioned Spark of Fae here in an earlier post, but I'm reposting about it, because the campaign is about to kick off! I've been talking with the players (well, most of them), and we've got some wonderful stuff built u[...]
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Magical Location Design: Establishing a Mood

I talked yesterday about designing a magical location around the effect it was supposed to have on the audience. But it’s one thing to say “I want this effect”, and another thing entirely to get the effect in q[...]
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An Interview With The Hellrider: Part 3: What are the Hellriders & the End of the Hellriders.

Sorry for the long delay, I’ve been caught up in real life again: Moving across the province, packing to move again to go back to university and the (fortunately friendly) end of a romantic relationship. Anyway, en[...]
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Three Starting Points for Designing Magical Locations

What fun is a fantasy world without inherently magical locations? They make it clear which genre you’re operating in, provide a little color, and because of the ability to use elements not present in mundane locati[...]
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The Uses of Ancient Civilizations

There’s one in every world, isn’t there? Somewhere in history, there was a civilization. It was advanced, or at least looked advanced, probably in the areas of magic or technology. At least one society is des[...]
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Characterization Exercise: Who’s Your Ideal Enemy?

There’s a lot to be said about the peculiar dance between two enemies: a blend of mutual hatred, a peculiar sort of chemistry, and who knows what in the middle. It makes conflicts interesting—but like a good roma[...]
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Threads of Sanity – Forgotten Realms Campaign

It has been four months since I was able to sit down to play some pen & paper roleplaying games. Being father to a small child of course reduces my time to play much, but nevertheless, I was able to pull together a g[...]
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Personal Observation: On Villains With Recruitment Spiels

An “Are you sure you want to continue fighting me?” in the middle of a fight. An “It’s a pity they’ve already got their hooks in you” between conflicts. A philosophical debate between enemies. I admit[...]
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Willing to Talk

One of the advantages I’ve always found of tabletop RPGs as compared to console RPGs is the ability to talk to one’s enemies, whether it’s face to face, by distant proxy, even (perhaps especially) in th[...]
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How to Integrate Social Players into your Session

I was watching a video taken from the recent Gencon, and it was detailing on open forum session for GM’s where they are able to bring issues amongst themselves and help each other out. A fantastic idea and for the two [...]
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RPG Review: Eureka: 501 Adventure Plots To Inspire Game Masters

Have you ever found a sandwich that’s so big, juicy, messy, and full of sandwichy goodness that you can’t figure out where to start eating it? That’s kind of what happened when I grabbed a copy of Eurek[...]
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Tales from the Sketchbook: Tsubame

A picture paints a thousand words; a picture with context can say a lot about a game; but explanations of the random sketches of an artist-gamer can say the most of all. In this series, I look at the just-had-to-draw-the[...]
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For New Players: How Does This Work Again?

It’s rough being a new player in an unfamiliar system, particularly when there isn’t much time to learn, or you’re the only one who’s functionally a new player. Particularly when there are two way[...]
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You Are Not the Star

As we begin this post, I'd like to forewarn you of something: this is not suited for all styles of play, and that's okay. I by no means think that this post describes elements that you definitively need in order to enjoy[...]
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Teaching a New Game: A Matter of Need To Know

Another one for RPG Blog Carnival. The most intimidating thing about a new player joining a game, particularly an old game, is the knowledge barrier—not only for the newbie, who has to absorb all the requisite informat[...]
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In Defense of Funny

I hear a lot of people talk about how they don't care for humor in their D&D campaigns. That's my favorite part! Find out a couple ways to introduce some levity into your game without annoying the crap out of everyon[...]
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Establishing Game Tone: Show, Don’t Tell

Playstyle, I think, is one of the likeliest things to drive a group apart. When you’ve got a full group on the same style, and on the same wavelength with the GM, it goes well. When you don’t…. well, yo[...]
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Critical Hits: Thoughts on Roleplaying

http://critical-hits.com/2010/08/16/renaissance-of-roleplaying/Go and check it out. Agree or disagree, this post is a good read.[...]
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Pre-made Art for Independent Publishers

Let me start out by saying that I am definitely not an artist. My artistic skills peaked when I was 12 or 13 and have had plenty of time to regress since then. But I understand the importance of artwork in roleplaying ma[...]
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Interview with Reality Blurs President, and author of Realms of Cthulhu, Sean Preston

In my review I asked the community for some good interview questions they would like to see answered by Reality Blurs President, and author of Realms of Cthulhu, Sean Preston. You guys delivered with some fantastic inqu[...]
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Renaissance of Roleplaying

I feel like it is possible to establish a renaissance of roleplaying, assuming you even want to, but it couldn't possibly work through just one devoted person, even if that person is the DM. It would just be too excrucia[...]
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Teaching a New System: Keeping the Player’s Interest

RPG Blog Carnival this month, over at Evil Machinations, is on teaching the game to new players, whether they’re raw beginners or just inexperienced with your particular system. I’ve had a lot of occasion to [...]
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More thoughts about Typography, or the tools used to create it…

Image by voyageAnatolia.blogspot.com via Flickr Long title, I know… But basically I am wondering how we might take the small things, such as the method of writing, and use that in a game. And by “method”[...]
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"Kick Ass!" 5th birthday blogparty#1. Prizes! Prizes! Prizes!

"Lights... Cameras... Action!"Alighting on this page as you have dear reader, be welcome to the 5th anniversary of "Roll dice and kick ass!". Yes, it's been 5 years to the day since I launched myself [...]
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XP: Digging a Little Deeper

Experience points are one of the most classic staples of roleplaying games. They're the primary means by which characters advance. They've also been nailed down and blamed for encouraging all manner of bad roleplaying ex[...]
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How Not To Be Lost in a Scene

Yesterday, I talked about how a GM or a writer can keep from misplacing characters in a character-dense scene. But while it’s harder for someone who controls multiple characters to keep perfect track of all of them[...]
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How Not To Misplace People in a Scene

One of the biggest problems with having four or five people operating in the same scene, regardless of its type, is the risk that the better-imaged ones will take over and the less-definite ones will get lost in the shuf[...]
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Comparing Conversation and Combat

What’s the difference between conversation and combat? I found myself asking that of one of my friends, while thinking about UZ’s recent question on keeping all participants in a conversation involving more t[...]
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An Interview With The Hellrider. Part 2: The Formation of the Hellriders

“You still here? Wanna hear more? Well why the fuck not? Buy me another drink and I’ll ramble a bit more. So most of us were originally ex-bikers, but a few like me were picked up for useful skills. I could f[...]
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Telling the Players A or B

During last week’s discussion of the two general options for presenting a challenge to the PCs, I mentioned one potential problem being the difficulty of getting across to the characters whether they’re deali[...]
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RPG Blog Carnival: Teaching the Game…

In 1982, when I was just starting the 7th grade, I met up with a group of people who were playing Dungeons and Dragons. We played a lot over the next few years. And there were few boundaries. We took on Tiamat, the Queen[...]
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With One Scene

Often, a writer can get away with establishing a character slowly, over time. In this scene, emphasizing this quality. In another scene, another one. A slow, gradual process. A GM with a long-term enough plan, or a playe[...]
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Ba-da-bing! Prevent Combat Drag

http://stuffershack.com/eliminate-combat-drag-with-realism/I'm gonna keep things real short, this has been a busy weekend, but I figured a late post is better than none at all. Suffice it to say, I've seen this stuff typ[...]
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…and What Exactly Do We Do Now?

I talked yesterday about hitting a game group with situations in which coming up with a way to get their desired result was part of the challenge. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t—but there’s one ma[...]
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GenCon Day 2, and Roleplaying for the Severely Disturbed

What a great day! I played the first session of the RPGA successfully, earning a +2 maul in the process. Stupid Ranger and I then attended about the coolest nerdy arts and crafts class ever: making a chainmail dicebag. W[...]
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Of GW, the lure of Chaos, gribblies, and stuff

Space Hulk wins 2 Golden Geek AwardsMy recent visits to the pages of Black Library novels: Graham McNeill's Heldenhammer- which I picked up at Conflict 2010, and Nathan Long's Bloodborn- which I reviewed last month; thes[...]
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So Here’s Your Problem….

In the time I’ve been playing in people’s games, I’ve noticed two overall styles of setting forth challenges in front of the group. One is that standard “this should be difficult but doable except wit[...]
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IC Questions I Really Need to Ask My Next Player

If there’s one thing I have learned from my game, it’s that it can be very, very difficult to play to a particularly reserved character. It makes sense that they’re not going to be fully realized starti[...]
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Situation Based Design versus Plot Based Design

I’ve been enjoying reading some of Justin Alexander’s articles over at his site “The Alexandrian” and I especially like his article on Prepping Without Plots. In his words a plot is a sequence of events: [...]
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Invented Historical Periods: Art

Yesterday, I talked about a trick for real-world settings, using various cues to establish the historical era, the decade, or even the year in which the story using the setting is itself set. That doesn’t work near[...]
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