A chronological listing of every post The Angry GM has ever… posted.
This isn’t a Feature about incorporating Character Arcs into tabletop roleplaying games. That would be interesting. This is a boring-ass Feature about players picking their own stupid character quests. Which is a terrible idea.
Now that you’ve decided to start a campaign and ignore your players’ input — you master of selfishness you — it’s time to start having visions.
Time for a little digression on the three kinds of Structure. Just don’t expect a useful lesson.
You can’t run a campaign without starting a campaign. And you can’t start a campaign without making ten thousand choices. And of all those choices, it’s the second one that’ll get you.
In the first in an official series of supporter-requested Features, I’ll tell you why your players don’t suck at tracking inventory and how to fix that.
You can’t manage a social gaming club that provides your friends with hours of fun unless you’re willing to be a selfish prick. Trust me; if there’s one thing I know, it’s being a selfish prick.
Thanks to a courageous remark by a Frienemy in my Discord server, I finally have my New Year’s Post. And to show my respect and gratitude, I shall now proceed to piss all over that remark.
Thanks to Frienemy-for-Life Mendel, I get to cancel myself by talking about what “always evil” means, how it’s different for orcs and devils, and why both are good for the game. Whee!
I warned you that I’d be putting this column on hold, but you all didn’t listen. You kept e-mailing me. Fortunately, I lied. So it’s Mailbag time.
All I wanted to do was clarify myself. I didn’t mean to end up rambling about what playstyles mean and where they come from and whether it’s time to add another letter to our favorite playstyle acronym.
I took a break from my holiday travels to answer some reader-submitted questions. Merry Christmas.
In another article I absolutely don’t want to write, I explain why not being able to boss your players around isn’t a lack of Game Mastering skill, it’s a personality defect. That should go over big.
It’s time for the long, lost, missing Encounter resolution lesson: how to resolve stealth actions and infiltration scenes. And after you read it, you’ll totally understand why I tried to cut it from the roster. Dumbasses.
“Angry,” everyone keeps asking me, “how can I fix D&D’s shallow-seeming, boring combat?” Well, here’s your answer: “You can’t! But maybe you shouldn’t!”
Another month is over. And as I look to the fresh hell of yet another new page on the calendar, I consign myself to the stale hell of responding to reader-submitted questions.
After many long years of refusing, I’m finally revealing the truth: just how do you take good game session notes. The answer isn’t what you think and you’re not going to like it. Which is pretty much standard for me.
Experienced Game Master suck at learning new TTRPG systems. But then, game publishers suck at teaching new TTRPG systems. It’s a match made in hell. Fortunately, Angry is here to help.
With this new, ongoing series of lessons, I — the Angry GM — intend to teach you everything you need to know to keep a Campaign alive until you grant it the sweet mercy of death.
Another month, another monthly Ask Angry mailbag, and another batch of people who can’t just ask a simple, straightforward question without treating me like a moron.
In this very special Ask Angry episode, I explore the view from the other side of the screen. What can a player do when their GM goes to The Angry GM for advice.
It’s time to wrap up this whole How to Run a Game Like a True Game Master thing by explaining how to Determine and Describe the Outcome of Social Actions in Social Encounters. And how to portray non-player characters properly.
To end the month, let’s open the gift that keeps on giving — or keeps threatening to give me an aneurism — the Ask Angry mailbag.
As I didn’t die in a fiery conflagration, I owe you a real lesson on the Art of the Cutaway. Here it is. Maybe next time, I’ll get lucky.
Time for a brief aside to answer a question from Aspiring True Game Master Sloth about managing the Action Queue when parties split themselves between scenes or tasks and an introduction to an art you already know.
It’s time for the actual, practical advice portion of the “resolving action scenes” lesson. And you did not read that title wrong. Because the first practical thing you’ve got to learn is that True Game Masters declare their players’ social actions for them. I shit you not.
Ending the month with another few pulls from the grab bag of content goodness that is the mailbag.
Sometimes, all it takes is one remark to set me off. And this time, I saw one remark about how to handle illusions. I didn’t read the actual remark or the hours of discussion around it, but I have opinions nonetheless.
Now that I’ve wasted thousands of words and several hours laying the groundwork for portraying NPCs, it’s time for me to lay the groundwork for resolving social encounters. Or rather, social conflicts. Because there’s still no such thing as a social encounter.
It’s time to dig back into the Font of Frustration that is The Ask Angry Mailbag! Why the hell can’t people follow basic instructions?
Let’s continue the discussion from last week and explore how Game Masters don’t roleplay. Ever.