Acting on the Edge of Your Seat
It’s time for some rambling naval gazing again. This is about dice systems, action resolution, and pacing.
It’s time for some rambling naval gazing again. This is about dice systems, action resolution, and pacing.
Figuring out when to fling a random encounter in the path of your hapless is the easy part. The hard part is designing good random encounters. Which are neither random nor encounters. Except they are encounters. Just don’t call them that.
Lots of GMs have given up on random encounters. And I can’t blame them. Random encounters suck. But throwing them out completely means throwing out a lot of useful stuff. Maybe we can build a better system instead?
I went to Gamehole Con. Which means I didn’t write an article. So here’s me passing my recap of Gamehole Con off as an article.
What do you do when you’ve got nothing? Figure out how to make nothing sound like something, send it out, and deal with the fallout later. And that’s exactly what I did when my Session Zero for my new campaign fell apart.
For the first time in three years, I – Angry – am running an actual, real-life, regular campaign. And it’ll provide a great example of how to cobble together a campaign you don’t have time to plan or run in a system you haven’t used in years. At least, my Patrons think it will.
Every settlement in an RPG has its own tone. It’s own flavor. At least, it should. If you want it to be good. But how do you convey that tone without just telling the players what it is?
Let’s talk about PPP and the crazy, brain-cancerous way many GMs deal with it.
Does time exist in role-playing games? No. It does not. And that’s a problem. Currently, one without a solution.
Epic quests for legendary treasure the pretty much the bread and butter of fantasy RPGs. But let’s not talk about that.
If you’re so smart, maybe you should come up with the ideas and I’LL judge YOU for a change. Go ahead. Answer Angry’s Question of the Week. If you dare.
Playing RPGs is exciting. Being creative is exciting. You know what isn’t exciting? Absorbing information someone else created. That sucks.
It’s time to finally talk about world building and setting creation. Which means it’s time for the obligatory, overly long semantically discussion about the definition of the thing I’m talking about. Enjoy.
The Angry Games corporate HQ in Wisconsin is FINALLY open for business. Here’s the schedule of content for the upcoming month!
The Angry GM is taking a vacation to rebuild his corporate office and his addled brain. It’s a last minute decision and I’m sorry. But everything didn’t go as smoothly as I hoped with the move. Don’t worry, though. The book is on schedule.
You asked for it. You wanted the fluffy, story bulls$&% to go along with the useful, systematic mythology-building thing I already posted. Here it is.
The Angry GM: The Website: The Book: The Kickstarter was a rousing success. And so, before I’ve even finished printing and mailing out the book, people are already asking me about The Angry RPG? Well, I’m not ready to design that thing yet. But I am ready to talk about why you need The Angry RPG in your life. Mainly by claiming to be smarter than everyone else in the industry.
A well-build mythology can drive stories and create a fantastic world. Unfortunately, D&D doesn’t provide such a mythology. But you can make your own if you understand thematic conflict.
People keep asking me how to draw good maps. Well, I can’t teach you how to draw pretty maps, but I can teach you how to draw useful maps. The trick is to stop trying to draw maps and start presenting information instead.
The good, the bad, and the ugly for the BIG MONTH. That’s right, July is the month where everything is changing. And the plan has changed due to life’s normal chaos. So, a revised battle plan is in order to make sure that everything that has to happen happens.
I forgot what a chore starting an entire new section of the dungeon was. On an entirely different floor. Especially when you have no vision of what that section should look like.
James Introcaso of Don’t Split the Podcast Network invited me to talk with him on his show, Table Top Babble. You should listen to the podcast. And then check out James’ other stuff too.
You can get a lot of mileage out of themes. Especially when you set up some thematic conflicts. You just have to know what themes are and how to set up their conflicts. And why “good versus evil” doesn’t count as a conflict.
Having developed a nice list of story turning points in previous articles, it’s time to turn our attention to Joseph Campbell’s monomyth and see what additional turning points he’s got to offer. And to see if there’s anything MORE IMPORTANT people overlook when talking about Campbell. Hint: there is.
You can go support The Angry GM: The Website: The Book right now at Kickstarter and get your very own copy.
There’s just one week until the Angry Book goes live on Kickstarter. Here’s what to expect in terms of my normal content release before, during, and immediately after the Kickstarter.
This month’s Fanservice BS is all about how to build a wilderness dungeon. And the answer is as disappointing as the topic.
It’s time to wrap up Day 1 by mapping the four remaining rooms and the boss arena.
This article EVENTUALLY builds a basic narrative structure for gamers. But first, it has to spend a time on some remedial lessons. Apparently, some things didn’t sink in the first time I discussed narrative structure.
The Angry GM: The Website: The Book is coming! And you can stay abreast on all of the latest developments. Here’s how…