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Finally! The Third Heat is revealed. Surprising no one, the Third Heat is “actual gameplay.” Because this whole thing was never about the heat. Rather, it’s about where the heat fits in your adventure design in a game where naked die rolls and open-ended creativity are both always possibilities.
I would love to actually talk about the third heat today and explain what the hell I even mean by that, but I can’t, because too many smart people asked me whether character building is a kind of gameplay and whether it would therefore count as some kind of heat of its own. Might it not be the fourth heat. Spoiler alert: yes, but no.
I love rolling dice as much as anyone. That’s why I love roleplaying games so huggy much and why I won’t buy any game that takes the Game Master’s dice away. But you can’t build gameplay challenges on dice rolling alone and that ain’t just me talking. In the second essay in my three-part series on proper gameplay and challenge design, we’re going to talk about why naked die rolling isn’t gameplay. According to actual experts.
It’s time close this Stupid Narration Tricks series once and for all. We had some fun, but it’s time to move on. In this final entry, I’ll share the two tricks I left unshared last week. Because, now that you’ve learned how to hide details in plain narrative sight, you’re ready to use repetition to make patterns and break them. Assuming you’re good enough.
In this penultimate lesson in my Stupid Narration Tricks series, I want show you the first of three tricks used by George R. R. Martin to hide important clues in plain narrative sight so that you can give your players a chance to spot important details and solve mysteries without falling back on die rolls and obvious expository reveals. The final lesson, next week, will cover the other two.
I love open-ended creative problem as much as anyone. It’s why I love tabletop roleplaying games oh so huggy much. But it’s too brittle to rely upon as core gameplay and that ain’t just me talking. There’s years of cognitive research about how people engage with open-ended “insight problems” showing that they’re just not a great thing to build gameplay around. That’s right; I brought receipts for the first in this three-part series about a more comprehensive approach to challenge design that allows for open-ended creativity and dice-rolling without letting either break the gameplay experience.
Box text seems like it should help Dungeon Masters run better Dungeons & Dragons adventures, but it hurts games and Game Masters a lot more than you might thing. Let me tell you why read-aloud text weakens scene-setting, kills pacing, overloads players, and keeps GMs from building one of their most important skills at the table. Whether you’re using published modules or writing your own adventures, it’s time for you to quit your dependence on box text.
A Dungeon Master does not merely draw a dungeon. Not if they care at all about actual, good game design. I’ve already showed you how to plan out a pretty good Dungeons & Dragon dungeon adventure. Now I’m going to show you how to make a pretty good dungeon map. And, as a bonus, how to turn a realistic floor plan into a good gameplay experience. It’s all to do with a trick called blockout.
In this series, I’ll show you homebrewer Dungeon Masters of any skill level how to use actual, good game design to build a pretty good dungeon adventure for Dungeons & Dragons or your system of choice.
We Dungeon Masters often describe our roleplaying game worlds like neutral, all-seeing narrator robots, and that means we’re wasting a lot of potential. Fantasy authors use this trick of picking viewpoint characters to provide sharper, more useful, more flavorful narration filtered through their characters’ expert lenses. Of course, that would never work at a Dungeons & Dragons table. We couldn’t possibly use viewpoint characters to punch up our scene-setting narration. Or could we?
We Game Masters never think about narrative points of view. We just default to the thing we’ve always done. Years ago, I suggested that it was time to switch from calling players you to a third-person approach. It was great for pacing and clarity, but it also changed how players connect to their characters. But is that a problem? More importantly, have you ever considered how your narrative point-of-view affects your game?
I’d love to teach you my stupid narration tricks, but not until you’ve proven you can handle normal narration tricks. Start drilling, kids.
What if you put dimensional shackles on an arch-hag? What if she puts them on herself? Why would she never do that? Why don’t you know how to read statblocks right?
As a Game Master, you are an author, but that doesn’t mean what most people think it does. What it mostly means is that you can learn a lot of stupid narration tricks from authors. And video games.
It’s time for the last piece of the four-part intro to the project that will eventually lead to a good, fun dungeon adventure. So let’s learn about path-depth and checkpoints.
How do you build a good monster hunt that feels like an actual monster hunt? It’s do-able, but you have to be careful not the make your game the Battletoads of D&D campaigns.
Now it’s time for the third and final short essay laying out the underlying design approach for our pretty good dungeon. Except this isn’t the final one and it isn’t short. This one’s all about how players decide where to go next.
Continuing my series of short, conceptual articles to set up the building a pretty good dungeon, here’s one about the idea of explorable space.
In the first of three precursor discussions to building a pretty good dungeon, let me explain why critical paths aren’t what they are and golden paths are better.
Hey! Let’s make a pretty good dungeon together. How about that?
Today, I’m going to tell you exactly how to screw over your players. That’s so you can stop yourself from doing it. Because screwjobs are bad.
When it comes to gameplay experiences, order matters. What comes first, what comes next, it’s literally a game changer. So what’s a conscientious adventure maker to do when roleplaying game is all about letting players explore any way they want?
The new…ish D&D DMG is actually a pretty good resource for adventure building tips, except for omitting one thing everyone stupidly hated because they were stupid. Let’s talk about The Adventure Day and what it really means.
How much of your prep time should you spend before the start of a campaign reviewing the players’ characters? How much time should you spend before each session reviewing their Reactions and Bonus Actions? I’m willing to bet the correct answer is, “More than you do.”
Before I move on from Scenario Shape, let’s talk a bit about we might apply these ideas to detailed Encounter building. When we actually get to that. Someday.
Now that you’ve learned how to break a scenario design into hierarchical levels, I can show you how to spot — and plan — a scenario’s shape. And what that means. And why its good.
I may have put True Campaign Managery on hold, but I’m still delivering on my promise to teach you how to resolve table conflicts like a True Campaign Manager. Settle in; it’s a long ride.
More True Scenario Design and more on structure. Actually, the real structure discussion starts here. Last time, I breathlessly yelled about what makes good structure good and bad structure suck. Now I’m actually going to show you structure. I’ll even outline a crappy adventure you can finish for your own use if you suck at tone and genre.
Let’s celebrate the start of the year’s back nine with an inspiring and uplifting message about how you misunderstood everything I said about everything about whether or not you suck and you suck for that. Or, to say it another way, let’s talk about real, human Game Masters balance good design with practical prep and polish.
It’s time to open a new chapter in our True Scenario Designery journey. So let’s talk about how scenario structure is like the beams and masts that hold up a confection shaped like an animated porifera. You heard me.