How to Run An Angry Open-World Game, Lesson Five: A Living World of S$&% to Do
In the fifth and first post-final lesson about Angry Open-World Gaming, I tell you how to populate your world with stuff to do and how to help your players find it all.
Memo to the Players #1: Taking Action
This is my first ever Memo to the Players. Specifically, your players. I’m taking time out of my busy life to do your job. To teach your players how to play D&D right. And I’m not talking about rules and mechanics. No. I’m teaching them how to actually do stuff in the game: take actions,…
Ask Angry August Mailbag: AOWG Special Edition
In this month’s Ask Angry mailbag, I answer a bunch of questions about my AOWG and the AOWG series in general.
What it Means to Know How to Play D&D
Why doesn’t anyone know how to play D&D? And why does anyone think they can teach someone else how to play a game they don’t know how to play? And should I fix the problem? Or am I just full of bulls$%&?
How to Run An Angry Open-World Game, Lesson Four: Prepping After the Fact
In the fourth and final lesson about Angry Open-World Gaming, I tell you how to prep for each and every AOWG session… after you’ve finished running it.
Like Players Do
I promised I’d write a whole article about that Player Do List thing. So here it… isn’t. Because I can’t. But I wrote you a better article about something that’s related to Play Do Lists but it’s also way better. Not that you’ll think so.
Ask Angry July Mailbag Lightning Round
It’s time to open the Ask Angry mailbag again. But, just for funsies, let’s see how many questions I can answer without exceeding too much my normal allotment of word count.
How I Roll: The Angry Manual of Style
This random pile of bulls$&% isn’t just me ranting at my current batch of players, I promise. It’s just me telling all of you how and I run my game the way I do and what I would rant at my players if I was ever going to do that.
How to Run An Angry Open-World Game, Lesson Three: Presenting An Explorable World of Adventure (Part 2)
In the second half of the third lesson about Angry Open-World Gaming, I tell you how to blow smoke at your players’ faces and call it exploration.
How to Run An Angry Open-World Game, Lesson Three: Presenting An Explorable World of Adventure (Part 1)
In the first half of the third lesson about Angry Open-World Gaming, I tell you what it means to explore a world and also what the single most important list in your bag is.
Exploring by the Rules
Today’s lesson about how you all break your games and then ask me to fix them. Specifically, it’s about how all the little, fiddly rules that don’t seem to do anything are actually the key to interesting, meaningful, fun gameplay.
The Quicksand Incident and A Tale of Two Angrys
All it took was one word from one image from one hastily scribbled list in last week’s article to find out that you’ve all learned nothing from me in the last twelve years. That word was quicksand.
How to Run An Angry Open-World Game, Lesson Two: What to Bring With You
In the second lesson about Angry Open-World Gaming, I reveal what’s in my gaming bag whenever I show up to run a session of my open world game.
Ask Angry May Mailbag: No Life Advice
Another month, another mailbag. This one’s all about making yourself a better GM. And nothing else. How much work to put in. How to work efficiently. And how to change your gaming habits for the better.
How to Add Motivational Experiences to Your D&D Game
This one’s what I call a shower article. Mainly because people complain when I call articles like this, “articles I s$&% out while I’m s$&%ing.” The idea’s the same though. The article’s the result of an idea that came to me while I was dealing with some biological need or another. I wasn’t specifically working…
How to Run An Angry Open-World Game, Lesson One: Three Pillars
In this, the first of four lessons about how to run your own open-world game just like Angry, you’ll learn why your brain is just too damaged to run a good open-world game. Again.
How to Run an Angry Open-World Game, Part I: You Can’t
Let’s talk about this Angry Open World Game thing. We all knew this was coming. You knew it. I knew it. The moment I said, “I could tell you all how I’m running my open-world campaign, but I know you’re not really interested,” you knew I was playing “dance for your article.” And you should…
How to Play an Angry Open-World Game
I figured out to run exactly the sort of open world game I wanted to run. The perfect game for my players. I just forgot to tell them that.
How to Actually Play a Character
In this article, the Angry GM will finally tell you exactly what role-playing is and exactly how to do it. He’ll give you a simple four-step process for playing a character. You just have to get through 4,000 words of preface first.
Ask Angry: Called Shots and Climbing Colossuses
This month’s Ask Angry column is all about one thing and just one thing: called shot systems. But it’s also about building a game around fighting giant colossus monsters. Oh, and it’s also about the real secret of getting players to play creatively. But aside from those two other things, it’s just about one thing.
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Hate the Dice
It’s time for me to answer the same basic GMing question I’ve been answering differently every few years for the last twelve: when should you resort to using the rules and the dice to resolve things.
Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Conflict But Were Afraid I’d Punch You for Asking About
It’s time for the first real article about Narrative Theory for GMs. The topic is conflict in traditional narratives and in RPGs.
On Being a (Game) Master Storyteller
Now that I’ve confused all of y’all thoroughly about plot structure, let’s start a new series on narrative theory for game masters. That can’t possibly go wrong.
Ask Angry March Mailbag
Another month, another pile of questions to answer.
Plot Architecture 101
In the SECOND part of my TWO part so far series on plotting a campaign, I explain what plot structure is and why it’s useful. You know, before I do any crazy s$&% like trying to tell you about Korean narrative structures and their applicability in exploration-based campaigns.
Build a Better Campaign by Exploiting the East
Let’s appropriate us some culture! Let’s use a 1500-year old Korean narrative style to plot a better pretend elf game!
Ask Angry: And the Angry GM Award for Scrupulous Fairness in Role-Playing Gaming Goes To…
The only reason I’m answering this question is because I was in pain and on drugs.
The GM’s Burden and Other Stories
The thing I like most about having a large fanbase and an active Discord community – apart from having my big-a$& ego stroked constantly — is that I don’t have to pick my own fights anymore. Used to be that if I wanted a f$&%ing fight, I had to go out and start one. But…
The Road Trip to Adventure
All you need to start a campaign is a bunch of a characters and a first adventure, right? That’s what I said. But if you’re going to start a campaign with an ongoing plot, that’s not true is it. Yes. It is. Come on a road trip with the Tiny GM and I and I’ll show you how.
Ask Angry January Mailbag
Ask Angry time again. This time, I’m addressing realism in games, facing, why the Faerunian commodities market is a sucky addition to the game, and how not to design a tracking system.