Gonna do a quickie today. At least, I think it’ll be quickie. Quickier than usual, anyway. For me. I just want to share a little trick that, if you make a habit of it, will help you run less worse games. A little bit of classic Angry.

Angry here, after the fact: FYI, it was not a quickie. Not remotely. But promising a short article and then covering three different topics in nearly 5000 words is also classic Angry.

This trick’s to do with game prep, but it’s not to do with the kind of game prep we’re always talking about. Rather, it’s to do with a kind of game prep we don’t talk about. But then, we talk about game prep the wrong way way too much. Because we suck.

Your Game Prep Sucks and So Does Mine

Game prep is important. You know it and I know it. Unless, of course, you’re one of those Game Masters who insists all your best games are improvised and that game design is railroading, but you and I both know those are lies and rationalizations because no they don’t and not it’s not. You’re just a lazy-ass Game Master who doesn’t think his players are worth running good games for.

Except you’re probably not lazy and you don’t hate your players. Actually, I think you’re just like the rest of us except, that instead of admitting you could be better, you lie to yourself so you don’t have to feel bad. I’m not forgiving you — that’s still bad — but I can’t call you lazy and I can’t say you don’t care about doing right by your players.

Game prep is important. You know it and I know it. The problem, though, is that it sucks. Even if you’re efficient about it and don’t have to do much of it and even if you’ve gotten to the point where you only mostly do the fun kinds of game prep, it’s still work and it still sucks. Consequently, you and me and every Game Master out there, we’re all looking for ways to do less of it or at least to make it suck less. Consequently consequently, every advice-giving Game Master on the internet has to spend a lot of time answering questions about how to game prep right or game prep better or telling people lies about how games are better without prep. Consequently consequently consequently, we all talk way too much about game prep.

Especially because none of the talk is remotely useful or helpful because we all know — you, me, and every Game Master out there — we all know exactly what we’re doing wrong and how to fix it.

Level with me, kids, what’s your prep really like? Don’t tell me what you wish you were doing or what you only do when you’re feeling really energized which isn’t actually very often if you’re honest. Tell me what your regular, normal prep is like. What do you do and when and how?

Except don’t tell me because I can tell you. Because I’m betting your game prep is a lot like my game prep.

At some point in the week leading up to my next game session, usually pretty close to the day of the actual game session, I sigh and put down my PS5 controller and say, “I guess I really should do some prep for my game.” Then I sit down and do my game prep.

What does that mean? What do I actually do? I don’t know. There’s no system to it. I just kind of do shit. Mostly because I let it go for too long and there’s really not any time to do anything remotely systematic. It’s not like I have time to reread the chapter of the module I’m fixing to run next — or review the notes for the adventure I wrote — so I just quickly skim it to remember what the hell is probably coming next. Then I just start kind of doing… you know… doing shit. I’ll quickly write some names on an index card because it seems like I should have a list of those names. Inevitably, I’ll hit on something big. “I need a map for this encounter,” I’ll say, or something like that. So I go looking for a map or I start drawing my own and then I spend way too much time trying to remember how the hell to get the grid to align the map in the virtual tabletop — which it never fucking does even though the pixel counts are exactly fucking right and why is this so fucking hard every fucking time — and then I’m out of time. It’ll be fine, though. I read the whole adventure that one time weeks ago — or I wrote the damned thing which automatically means I remember every single detail even if I never reread it even one time — and that’s good enough so I can take it from here. Then I go back to my video game.

Does that sound right? I nailed it, didn’t I? Of course, I did.

Game prep sucks. We all know it’d be better if we did it systematically and built a habit of it. We know we should actually deliberately schedule the two, three, or four hours we know we need between games to get ready for the next one. We all know we should divide our prep into deliberate steps and work our way through them, prioritizing the most important shit first, and not wasting time on pixel-perfect fog-of-war maps with animated weather. But we keep just not doing it. Instead, we wait way too long and drag ourselves forlornly to our game prep and then let ourselves get distracted from it by useless, unnecessary crap that feels like prep.

We know we do prep bad. We know it hurts our games and stresses us out. So we’re always looking for advice about how to do it better. But the only advice we actually need is “suck it up, buttercup.” There is nothing anyone can tell any of us about game prep that we don’t already know. We know exactly how to do game prep. We just don’t want to do it. Because it’s a frigging chore.

Do you need me to spell it out for you? Fine. Here it is. Here’s the only advice about game prep you’ll ever need.

First, make it a damned habit. Schedule time to prep for every session and stick to it. Treat it like going to the gym or going to work or attending your therapy appointment.

Figure out how much time you need to prep and schedule that much time. Do you need two hours? Three? Four? It varies. Me? I need about two hours to prep for a four-hour session if we’re in the middle of an adventure. If I’m starting a new adventure, I need four hours to prep for the first four-hour session. If I’m writing the adventure, I need four to eight hours to write an adventure that’ll fill one to three sessions depending on the complexity and whether I really want to give it my all or whether it’s just a light filler adventure.

Do you work better if you build momentum or do you work better in multiple, short shifts? Me? I work better in two-to-four hour chunks but I rarely have a four-hour chunk, so it’s best if I split my prep into two hour chunks here and there.

Now that you’ve got it scheduled and made a habit of it, come up with a checklist. Come up with a system for prep and follow it. This ain’t rocket surgery; it’s really simple. First, reread the part of the module that summarizes the adventure, then reread the part of the module you’re getting ready to run next. Read. Don’t skim. As you do, take note of any game rules and mechanics you’ll need to review like underwater combat or doing surgery on a mortally injured crime victim or whatever. Take note, also, of any details you’ll need to organize and any resources you’ll need to run the game. Do you need to summarize the nonplayer characters into a list for easy reference? Do you need to draw a flowchart of the events in this section of the game with page numbers so you can flip to the right spot in the module as the players navigate the adventure? Is there a timeline you’ll need to answer questions about? Do you need maps? Tokens? Stat blocks? Make quick notes on scratch paper about what you’re gonna need.

Now, work down that list. First, review the rules and mechanics that are going to come up and flag them in the book with little sticky tabs so you can find them again at the table when you forget them. Or take some quick bulleted notes. Next, work through the notes you need. Make that list of NPCs, draw that flowchart, and write out that timeline. Whatever. Work in chronological order and make sure you have the resources for the scenes and encounters you know you’re going to get in the session in the order you’re going to get to them. This is where it helps to know how much shit your players tend to get through in a session. It helps you know how much you need to prep for.

In that same order, start gathering the resources. Make sure you have the bare minimum for everything before you start prettying anything up. If the map in the module is perfectly serviceable, use it. If the stat blocks are already in the book, flag them for ease of reference. If you’re doing this shit electronically, make a hyperlinked list so you can click once to get to a stat block you need. Default tokens are fine. If you’re doing the VTT thing, gather all of the minimal resources first into a folder, and then, once everything you need is gathered, then do a bulk import, and finally systematically adjust the grids, labels, and settings as you need to.

When you’re done with all of that, if you have any extra time, use it to enhance what you’ve got. Pick the biggest, bestest, most dramatic scenes to pretty up first. The climactic boss fight? That’s the map you enhance first. Make a better map, add lighting and weather effects, and do the fog of war crap. Is there a revelation that would really shine with a visual aid? Make it now.

Use every minute of time you allotted to yourself. When you finish doing the minimum, use the rest of the minutes on enhancing the game in whatever way strikes your fancy, as long as it’s stuff that’s going to enhance the player experience.

See? There is nothing there you didn’t already know or couldn’t figure out. Some of you dumbasses are always telling me I’m just spitting facts that are super obvious in hindsight, but that never occurred to you to think about, like you think that’s some awesome compliment instead of a kick in the dick, but this is me really doing that. I’m telling you what you already know but don’t let yourself see because it leads to the conclusion that the only thing stopping you from being great is your own lack of discipline.

Yeah.

But none of that’s what I wanted to talk about. I don’t want to talk about how to prep for your next game. The above two-thousand words where I tell you how to fix your game by calling out your shitty habits and admitting they’re mine and telling you to knock it off and do better? That’s all just bonus content. Kind of.

See, I want to talk about a part of the prep process no one talks about and, very specifically, how to use it to enhance the feeling of player agency in your game — not that I’m going to be doing the agency rant today — but your prep sucks so bad that I knew none of you would have room to do this little trick I’m gonna talk about unless I fixed your whole prep process for you first.

The real prep article starts here…

Post-Play Pre-Prep Prep

Let’s talk about peeing after your game.

You see, what I did there was I came up with this consonant phrase to describe a useful Game Mastering game preparation habit that uses repeated initial unvoiced bilabial plosive phenomes and made a pee-pee joke out of it.

Incidentally, if you want to help me make more content like this, there are several ways to support my work.

So Post-Game Pre-Prep Prep — or Peeing After Your Game — is actually just a very simple little thing. Just thirty minutes of work after each game session will help you focus on your players’ actions and the impact they have on a dynamic game world. It’s actually so simple that I had room for two thousand words that would fix everyone’s game prep process correctly forever and a dozen words to waste on a clever mature joke about bodily fluids.

I’ve talked before about setting aside some after-game time to do some note-taking, bookkeeping, and cleanup. I especially told you how it would help you manage an open-world game in a homebrew setting. I’m going to repeat — and refine — some of what I’ve said before, but I’m also going to add a new idea into the mix and put it all together into a process that can benefit any Game Master. Whether you’re running published adventures or writing your own content and whether you’re running an open-world campaign or just dungeons-of-the-week in walking distance of the characters’ hometown, Peeing After Your Game can help you.

Establishing a Pee Break Habit

First…

Let’s pretend you don’t actually suck at prepping for your next game session. Let’s pretend you’ve got a solid prep habit and you use your time efficiently and all that crap. Let’s pretend you’re pretty much always pretty well-prepared for your next game session. And let’s also pretend that you actually care about your game and your players and that you’re always on the lookout for something you can do to improve your Game Mastering. How can you — a totally nonexistent being — get even more out of your game prep habit?

To your question a question: what do you do after each game session? Do you start prepping for the next game the second the last player’s ass is out the door? Because you should.

Actually, that’s not only unreasonable, it’s incorrect. You shouldn’t do that. But you absolutely should start your prep 12 hours after the end of each session. Ideally anyway. More realistically, what you should do is block out thirty minutes to Pee — sorry, that ain’t going away — what you should do is block out thirty minutes to Pee sometime between 12 and 24 hours after the end of each game session.

Given your excellent time management skills and Game Mastering habits, that should be easy for you and you can ride your unicorn to your secret Game Mastering garden retreat every week to do it and enjoy the snacks your players always generously bring you.

Peeing Out a Recap

Now, the first step in your Post-Game Pee Break is a step I’ve covered before, so I’m not going to go into too much detail. Besides, it’s a pretty easy step. You just want to review the session you just ran in your mind and write down the major events that happened. In other words, you want to outline your recap.

You do start every session with a recap, right?

As I’ve said in the past, most Game Masters are actually pretty bad about recaps. Some don’t do recaps at all and some leave it up to the players to do them. On the other end of the crap Game Mastering spectrum, some Game Masters do absolutely too much recapping, retelling the entire story of the game in excruciating detail with blow-by-blow accounts of every last fight. Worst are the Game Masters who type up pages of recap and send them out to the players between sessions. Or let their players do that shit in the form of character journals or epic poems or some horseshit like that.

I am not going to explain again why all that crap’s wrong. Check out this article I wrote nearly a decade ago called The Art of the Recap for more on that and on good recapping habits.

A recap is a concise summary of the last session’s major plot beats delivered by the Game Master in the first few minutes of a game session. Anything that isn’t that is wrong.

Because of that, during your Post Game Pee, you just need to write a quick bulleted list of the major events of your previous day’s game session. If it doesn’t fit on an index card, you screwed up. And there should still be room on the index card when you’re done.

Why do you need room? Because after the proper recap, you also need to compile a quick list of reminders. You want to list the important details the players learned or the resources they gained access to or the plans they made that they haven’t gotten to implement yet. You want to be just as detailed with those as with the recap itself, which is to say, barely at all. We’re talking phrases or sentence fragments. You want to help the players remember shit, you don’t want to remember for them. Besides, if they want more details, they’ll ask.

The final note to make at the end of your recap is where the session ended and where the next one’s going to start. Where are the characters and when is it and what were they fixing to do next.

That’s it. That’s recapping. It should take you ten minutes.

Peeing on Your World

A few years ago, I introduced y’all to the concept of a campaign bible. Especially those of you who wanted to run games in homebrewed settings of your own. I explained that campaign bible is just a fancy term for a compiled list of all the details you’ve established about your world. Nations, factions, historical events, important locations, important characters, and so on.

Now, the idea wasn’t to dump piles of exposition into a notebook or a OneNote database but rather, to introduce and establish details as you ran the game and then to sprinkle them onto your bible once they came up during actual, practical game prep or in a game session. Thus, if you were writing an adventure and needed to invent an antagonistic faction, you’d add the faction to the bible then and there and if, later, during a game session you established the name of a nearby kingdom and its king and some detail about its major export, you’d add that to the bible after the session.

The thing is that this bible shit is actually useful regardless of whether you’re running a homebrew game or whether you’re running published adventures in an established setting. The fact is that as soon as you start running the thing for yourself, you’re going to establish details of your own and you want to keep track of them so you can use them later.

Thus, during your pee break, after you’re done recording your recap, you should take ten minutes to jot down any important details you established during your session so you can add them to the bible.

For more on this bible shit, check out my Angry’s Open-World Game series.

And now for that one little trick that’s the actual whole point of this article.

Peeing to Remember

Most games and worlds are too damned static. Even if you, the Game Master, let your players choose their goals and choose their paths, you don’t show the players the impact they’re having on the world nearly enough, or, at least, you don’t show it the right way.

Consider the town at the heart of your open-world game. The home-base. It’s a pretty stable, pretty reliable place, isn’t it? Not counting big-ass adventure-level threats and transformations, when’s the last time you actually changed the map. Or even changed the narrative description. When was the last time something new happened there?

The same is true of most game adventures. Once that adventure’s been written or designed or whatever — whether by a homebrew Game Master or by some professional publisher — most Game Masters don’t make changes to it. Any changes that happen are the ones that were already written in as possibilities.

Obviously, if the town’s threatened by a dragon to set the hook for an adventure, that’s got an impact. Obviously, if the players shore up the town’s defenses in Act II, that’ll change things. The outcome of the climactic dragon attack in Act III will definitely leave a mark. That big shit that you build into your designs is not what I’m talking about here.

I’m talking about the little shit here. I’m talking about the choices the players make that aren’t big or consequential and that may or may not be foreseen by whoever wrote the world and the game. Like, say, a character choosing to donate some treasure to a local temple. Or the players capturing a goblin and letting him go when he’s got no useful information for them. Or what if the players rescue most of the prisoners but they don’t get to a few in time and they don’t come back? Yes, they won the adventure and yes, they’re remembered as heroes, but some father also lost his little girl and the world should remember that too.

So maybe the temple’s preist has some much-needed repairs done. Or maybe he leaves a gemstone or statuette from the treasure on display in the narthex. Maybe the goblin didn’t run off into the wilderness but returned to the lair and, later, when the players are in trouble, he lends them a little aid because they showed him mercy. Maybe the dad takes to drinking, gets into fights, and ends up locked in the pillory. Maybe, now that the bandits have been run off, some new people move into town. Maybe a new shop opens up.

These tiny little things — the results of incidental player choices and actions — are impossible for Scenario Designers to foresee, let alone prepare for. They’re just too small and too personal. But, paradoxically, it’s actually those sorts of small, personal things that — when they’re remembered by the game — make the players feel like their actions matter. I mean, no one’s surprised when everyone in the game remembers that the heroes saved the village from the dragon. That sort of shit is impossible to forget. But when the game remembers that the party donated a particular gem to the church on a whim or that the party’s cleric spent a day of downtime with the local priest tending to city’s sick and needy or that the doctor left her garment bag behind in the car when she brought the rest of her luggage inside, it shows the players that the world is a real place. Even their smallest actions and minor whims have an impact.

It’s sad then that most Game Masters don’t put any time into these sorts of minor remembrances. Those remembrances really do leave the players seeing the world as a living, breathing place that’s shaped by everything they do. The Game Masters who run published adventures in established settings are especially lax here. They tend not to change anything or, if they do change anything, it’s because they want to put their own creative spin on the game they’re running rather than bring the world to life for the players.

So how can you capture that kind of magic? It’s actually incredibly easy. It starts with ten minutes out of your Post Game Pee Break.

After you’re done recapping and noting reminders and details for your bible during your Post Game Pee, take two index cards or sticky notes or whatever. Label one Now and the other Later. Now, think back through your last game session and pick two things you want the game to remember. Things the players did or chose not to do, minor incidents or exchanges, outcomes they achieved or failed to achieve, whatever. It literally doesn’t matter what they are. As mentioned above, you might note a day spent tending to the sick, a donation or a gift given, an act of kindness or mercy, or an item left behind. Anything is game and, honestly, the smaller the better. Just pick two. One for now and one for later.

The now card goes into your game notes or your module or whatever. Whatever you’re going to use when you actually sit to prep for your next game session. When you do, you’re going to find that card and you’re going to figure out one change to make or one element to add as a result of whatever incident or event or choice you wrote down. It doesn’t have to be big — it need not have any payoff at all — because the point is just to say, “the game remembered you did that because it’s a real world and you matter in it.” So maybe the goblin helps the players or maybe a kid brings a character a honeycake to thank him for taking care of his sick mother or maybe it’s just the tatters of a cocktail dress shredded by a demon tearing up cars in a parking lot.

The later card goes into your campaign notes or bible. Whatever you’re going to refer to when you’re planning the next chunk of your campaign or adventure or when you’re updating your campaign bible. That’s where you’re going to make some kind of more permanent change to the world. Like the repairs to the church or the display in the narthex or the new shop that opens up or the despondent drunk in the town pillory. Hence putting the card somewhere you’re going to find it later.

It doesn’t matter what you actually do with these details. I can’t stress that enough. Nor can I stress enough that the smaller and more intimate and more personal these details and their consequences, the better. If you can find a way to connect the consequences to the choice or event in a natural, organic, non-expositionary way through gameplay, more the better. If you can’t, that’s fine. Either the players will make the connection and be happy to see the world remembering what they did or they won’t make the connection this time around and they’ll just think you run a dynamic, living, breathing world. In the business, we call that a no-lose proposition.

And all it takes to empower yourself to do this shit is ten minutes out of your Post-Game Pee break to write down two forgettable things you want your game to remember.

So, you know, make that a habit.