The Power of Editing
If you’re having trouble handling wilderness travel, maybe the problem is you forgot how to use narration and action adjudication to pace your game. Just like every other average GM out there.
Why’d You Have to Go and Make Things So Complicated?
The Tension Pool was such a nice, simple mechanic. Why’d you GMs have to make it so complicated? Is it because I didn’t explain how to use it? Or where to build the complexity? Hint: you put the complexity in the Complications!
Encumbrance, Rations, and Other Crap You Hate Tracking
Tracking ammo sucks. Tracking encumbrance sucks. Tracking food and water sucks. But maybe, just maybe, there’s a good reason to do it anyway. As long as the game system doesn’t undermine you.
Flight to Elturel: An Object Lesson in Adventure Design: Designing Part 1 (Part 2)
Continuing my look at how I designed the first adventure of my new campaign, I describe how I designed the first scene of Flight to Elturel and the three encounters that made it up.
Does Ammunition Really Matter Matter Matter?
GMs tend to make a lot of bad decisions for good reasons. One bad decision a lot of GMs make has to do with tracking ammunition. Or not tracking ammunition.
Between Adventure and Encounter
The D&D Level Editor that is the DMG would have you believe that an Adventure is just a string of Encounters that maybe all get placed on a map. But there’s something between Adventure and Encounter that good game designers use to great effect. And even though you’re probably not a good game designer, you can use it too.
The Flesh Golem is Willing, But the Spirit Failed its Morale Saving Throw
Once upon a time, D&D featured complex morale rules. Then the designers realized the problem and simplified and streamlined them. Nah, I’m just kidding. They just said, “screw it” and threw everything. Because fixing things is harder than deleting them.
Dreaming of a Game Without Books
I have a dream. A dream of a TTRPG whose rulebook you could lose for a month without noticing.
The Road to Elturel: An Object Lesson in Adventure Design (Part 1)
Recently, I actually got to run a game! And that means I got to write an adventure! And since we’re talking about adventure design right now, I can use that adventure as an object lesson in adventure design.
Tension on the Road to Elturel
I’ve been tinkering, off and on, with this Time/Tension Pool thing because my readers were smart enough to recognize a good thing even when I didn’t. And I’ve finally figured out a way to incorporate it into wilderness travel adventures.
Coping with Loss
Table-top RPG adventure designers can learn a lot from video games. But one thing they can’t learn from video games is how to cope with loss. That is, how to make loss and failure part of the game.
Angry’s Guide to Experience
Every time I talk about experience points, people want to pick a fight about it. Well, this is my last word on XP: how to properly award XP in D&D 5E, regardless of what the rules say, and regardless of what other players and GMs say.
The World of D&D According to Rosewater… According to Angry
So, we all know that D&D is a game engine, not a game. But what parts of the game does the GM need to complete to bring it up the standards of Magic: the Gathering? Trust me, that question makes sense in context.
Hashtag Adventure Goals
Without a goal, a game isn’t a game. And since D&D is a game without goals, that means it’s your job as an adventure designing GM, to set a goal.
Dice: Beautiful and Terrible as the Dawn (Whatever THAT Means)
If you want to understand Angry’s All-Encompassing Action Adjudication Axiom, it’s important that you know why we even dice. And why dice suck.
Ask Angry Lightning Round
It’s been a long time since I answered some reader questions. So, let’s see how many of these I can get through without losing my freaking mind.
Your Ability Scores Suck
I should really know that I can’t just drop a comment like “ability scores suck in D&D and I would handle them so much better” without people demanding that I explain myself. Well, here it is. I’m explaining.
Good Ingredients Make Good Adventures
How is an adventure like a cake? Both of them are delicious baked goods that I love to eat, except for the adventure. But they are alike in that they need the right ingredients to be any good. And this adventure is all about cakes, adventures, and ingredients. Except it’s not really about cakes. I wish I had some cake.
Plan Hard, Work Hard, Play Hard
Much as I would love to sit here and describe the various elements of a homebrew adventure, you’re not ready for that crap yet. You don’t even know how to plan, I can’t tell you what to plan.
Being In-Flex-Able
I WAS going to rant about ability scores. But I accidentally ended up giving good advice about being inflexible for the good of the game. Sorry.
Gambling on Action
What if it turned out that everything I ever taught you about action adjudication was wrong? And that there was an entirely different way of looking at actions in role-playing games? Well, don’t worry. Nothing I told you was wrong. But there is another way of looking at actions. And sometimes, everything I told you is wrong. Sometimes, you’re not resolving an action, you’re taking a gamble.
More Accounting for Magical Items
Hacking a complex subsystem into a game requires you to work within the limits of the system. Sometimes, though, the system has some underlying patterns you can spot if you look hard enough. And those patterns help you make room for what you’re doing.
So You Want to Brew an Adventure?
People keep asking me to revisit adventure building. And to make it clear and useful. Maybe spell out a nice, simple process. Fine. Let’s talk about building your own adventures from scratch. Again. Only better.
Accounting for Magical Items
Hacking a complex subsystem into a game requires you to work within the limits of the system. Unfortunately, the system doesn’t always make it easy to find those limits. For example, let’s look at how D&D 5E might constrain my crafting system?
A Trifecta of BS
This month’s BS article focuses on… nothing. It’s an unfocused mess in which I ramble about three completely unrelated issues in modern game that are probably only a problem to me. Enjoy.
Dear Players: There’s a Better Way to Play
This isn’t for you GMs to read; it’s for you to print and hand to your players. That way, they can declare actions and play the game in a way that actually let’s you, you know, run a good game. Just let me talk to them. I’ll be nice.
Barking at Your Players: Advanced Combat Narration
There’s more to narrating combat than just flowery prose. Actually, there’s less. Combat needs less narration, more emotion, and more information.
Theorycrafting an Unsummary
We’re back to talking about crafting. And it’s time for more thinking and pondering and brainstorming. Sorry, kids, that’s what design is. It’s about thinking, pondering, and making things way more complicated for yourself.
Drawing an Unnecessary Map of Nothing At All
The first thing every GM does when they decide to create their own setting is to start drawing a map. And there’s no reason for that. Except one reason. Which is why that’s the first thing I did for my Pathfinder campaign.
I Am a Free Agent!
Here’s your monthly dose of pointless BS. Pontification about the non-problem of GMing agency which not only fails to answer the question, but also fails to even find a question to ask. But it does invite you to comment.