Weather, lunar phases, dates, and seasons? Why keep track of that crap in your game? Well, there’s several reasons, but only one that matters.

Sometimes, a GM has to fit an entire gaming experience in a single, limited time slot. And a GM has to do some ugly, ugly things to make that happen.

It turns out that it’s actually important for players to periodically describe their characters to the group. Unfortunately, players suck at everything. Especially describing characters. Fortunately, I wrote a script you can force them to follow.

How you start your game determines how it goes. And that doesn’t just affect you, it affects your players. Fortunately, Angry’s got a startup script you can install in your GM brain.

I’ve been pushing GMs to turn all the bookkeeping and character maintenance crap in D&D into a game of its own. Or rather, into a part of the game at the table. But many GMs have raised a question: what if their players don’t want to do that crap.

So, how does one go about turning a warlock — or any PC — to the Dark Side? In what will likely prove to be the most divisive and controversial post I’ve ever written, I’ll tell you…

Do you want your players to think strategically, act tactically, and play as a team? Well, I’ve got good news and bad news. The good news is I can help. The bad news is you’ve got some hard work to do.

After posting several Angry Table Tales — well, two — I’ve been asked by numerous people — well, two — why there are so many NPCs in the Angryverse. Here’s my answer.

I don’t have a Long, Rambling Introduction™ today. Sorry. I considered several rants that might fit here. I thought about pissing and moaning about modern dice designs and dice accessories like dice towers and dice trays and how the people who use that s$&% need to die in a fire. I also thought about whining,…

As promised, a break from the treasure talk to analyze automated action adjudication through “general approaches.”

Since you all asked, here’s an article about How I Handle Treasure — especially art objects — in D&D. Which isn’t how “you” should do it. I’ll tell you How You Should Handle Treasure later.

Basic RPG turn order. It’s easy when the actions are easy. But when the actions are big and complex, it’s still easy. You just have to know how to handle arbitrary s$&%.

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.

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…

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.

A long time ago, I tried to write a blog post about how to run good mysteries in D&D. But then, I got distracted and became The Angry GM. Ten years later, D&D has become even worse for running mysteries and I need to fix it to finish my latest project. But this isn’t about mysteries. It’s about using proficiencies right in 5E.

Ideally, your game will have a perfect one-to-one ratio of players to characters. But sometimes the characters split up or a player skips a game or someone gets killed. What do you do then?

A campaign bible is a powerful tool any GM can use to run a better campaign. As long as they don’t f$%& it up by trying to do it right.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Every settlement in an RPG has its own tone. It’s own flavor. At least, it should. If you want it to be good. But how do you convey that tone without just telling the players what it is?