A chronological listing of every post The Angry GM has ever… posted.
Remember last year when I decided to apply Mark Rosewater’s definition of what makes a game a game to D&D? And I got halfway through and then collapsed into a full-bore rant about D&D’s design? Well, I’m back to provide the other half and then collapse into another full-bore rant. Wheeee!
Should players ever have to make morale checks to stay in the fight?
What do you do when you don’t like what your GM does? Or one of your players? Try to get the Angry GM to yell at them for you of course. But Angry isn’t some sweary ninja for hire. Sorry.
Weeks ago, I showed you how to f$&% CR and build monsters with my way better and way more awesome system. And then I promised I’d also show you how to put those monsters together into encounters. Well, I’m finally back to make good on that promise.
Do you cancel too many games? Do you put off working on too many projects? Do you find yourself falling behind in your gaming obligations? Well, I sure as hell did. And what helped me might help you too.
Whenever I even hint at the idea that there’s some specific pile of setting lore that governs everything I do in my home games, I get lots of people demanding I share it all. And publish a campaign setting book about it immediately. Well, that ain’t going to happen. But if I ever did, this is what the part about Undead would look like.
Weeks ago, I told you to f$&% CR and build monsters and encounters the better way. And I confused a lot of people and even made a few people angry. So, here’s a quick and dirty example of how to build a simple monster – two different ways – that should dispel the confusion. But it won’t make the angry people less angry. Not that I care. F$&% ’em.
I wish people would stop asking me how “the Angry RPG” is going to handle ability scores or feats or initiative or whatever. Not because I don’t want to tell people about “the Angry RPG,” but because those words don’t mean anything.
How much stuff should an adventure have? How many encounters? How many goals? How long should an adventure take to play? Is there a simple template you can build an adventure around? Yes. Yes there is. Because I wrote one.
I hate when people misuse my teachings to ruin things. Like maps. It’s okay to have nice maps. Even if you’re a mapaholic. But you should know how not to use a map. Especially in combat. You need to learn how to run a battle without a grid.
A couple of weeks ago, I delivered a pair of seminars at GameholeCon VII in Madison, Wisconsin. And I recorded the things so I could eventually get them posted over on YouTube on a brand new Angry Games YouTube channel. Which I have now more or less done. Actually less. There were some issues.
Maybe this is just me being an angry, 40-something, gen x grognard, but gamers today have lost touch with some essential skills. Skills that those fancy core books USED TO teach you. Like mapping. And calling. Which is what this one is about: calling.
Maybe this is just me being an angry, 40-something, gen x grognard, but gamers today have lost touch with some essential skills. Skills that those fancy core books USED TO teach you. Like mapping. And calling. But this one’s about mapping.
A lot of people have been asking me how to use maps at their realspace, physical gaming table. Especially if they aren’t independently wealthy DIY gadget heads. The problem is, modern modules and virtual tabletops have confused everyone about the use about maps in games. Fortunately, I’m too old to know about that crap, so I’ll show you how maps are really done.
Bonus content! After I spent over 5,000 words telling you how to use maps at your game table in a practical, useful way, I’m going to spend 2,800 words telling you how NOT to use maps at your table. And why NOT.
In this installment of the increasingly sporadic Ask Angry series, someone asks me how to build a transforming dungeon based on a five minute cold open to a TV show that’s been turned into a half-assed licensed product by everyone’s favor half-assers: Wizards of the Coast. And, as usual, I finished assing it for them. It is fully assed.
I did an interview for the Investigation Check podcast! Check it out. And look for upcoming livestream content and new articles next week after I’ve recovered from Gamehole Con.
I have a rule against ranting about my players on my site. But that doesn’t mean I can’t use them as an example when they do the same thing that literally everyone else in the world does and I want to rant about everyone. At least I hope that’s how it works. At least, I hope my players don’t read this.
You know what? I’m sick of dealing with all the overly complicated, overly precise mathematics of encounter and custom monster design in D&D 5E. So I’m going to design an easier way to handle all of this. Unfortunately, I have to rewrite the whole Monster Manual to do it.
You know what? I’m sick of dealing with all the overly complicated, overly precise mathematics of encounter and custom monster design in D&D 5E. So I’m going to design an easier way to handle all of this. I just hope I don’t have to rewrite the whole Monster Manual to do it.
Finishing my look at how I designed the first adventure of my new campaign, I describe how I designed the second scene of Flight to Elturel as a moving parts adventure full of humanity and conflict and s$&%.
Everyone wants exploration in their game and everyone tries to put it there, but almost no one gets it to feel right. Probably because no one can even define exploration. Until now.
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.
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!
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
I have a dream. A dream of a TTRPG whose rulebook you could lose for a month without noticing.