Huge News!!!

You following me on Patreon? Nope, now you should. Even if you cannot contribute. All articles will be released there instead of here from now on. You’ll get an update every Friday or Saturday. Yes, the articles are still free! Contributing helps, and rewards you as well; it helps keep them coming. I just don’t need to update multiple sites anymore, and you don’t have to worry about waiting a week for the newest articles!

Check out my Patreon page here!

GM Help – Creating Story to Entertain

I’m writing this coming off of a very rough session in my Prime campaign (Session 20). It was a session that I knew was not going to be easy on the players. Where combat was 50/50 the whole way through, one wrong move would lead to failure. When the players failed, it hit them hard. Perhaps because this is the first time the failure was their own fault; and they could have prevented it by remembering just one or two things. They were down a party member, in the heat of combat most of the night, and just kept on their toes. The pressure was too much as we ventured into our first post level 10 session of 5^th edition. It was awesome, heartbreaking, and frustrating. My players trust me enough as a GM that they still look forward to the next session; where things will likely come full circle in a way they never expected. All of session 20 came from just one paragraph on a paper I did earlier that day; as does most of my session planning. This isn’t an article to help you write concisely though, I want to help you create interesting and entertaining stories.

Creations – Fungal Fomorians

Unlike the Fomorians found in the D&D 5e Monster Manual these aren’t deformed giants of the Underdark, cursed by fey magic. These were once pixies and sprites within the Great Kedu Tree in my homebrew campaign “Prime”. The fungal spores that escaped the Temple of the Earth Aspect twisted these poor souls into hideous monstrosities bent on consuming all. On Prime, everything is bigger; these pixies and sprites were the size of regular people.

Player Help – Power Gaming

By the sheer force of having fun and accidentally making strong characters. I’ve become quite the power gamer, when I do get the chance to sit down and play. I don’t do it on purpose, I simply want to have fun. I don’t specifically look for the best and most broken options for the characters I make. In those rare times I got to play, I discovered something. My characters are strong! It just stems from the thought that I focus on my character’s strengths when designing them and picking their abilities and options. I put myself into my character’s shoes and go from there. With all of that said, my game masters never complained. If you find yourself making strong characters time and time again, you might be a power gamer too. A lot of people dislike these sorts of players because they can zap the fun out of a campaign. I hope this guide will help you find a comfortable seat at your gaming table (virtual or not)!

GM Help – How I GM

With a growing audience on the twitch stream, and new followers across all of my sites; I often get the question “I love your style, how can I do things like you?” Well, I do like to wing things and not fully prep my games. It makes things feel more fluid, but I think it’s less on emphasizing that; and more on how I choose to handle the bulk of rules regardless of what system I use to GM for.

Shot down, in a blaze of glory.

I could smell the burning rubber. I tried to shut her down fast. But, the old monster’s power supply overheated (fans were still working, it was a capacitor blowout) and she decided to take out the motherboard and perhaps several other parts with her.

My desktop bit the dust. As a computer repair person for 6+ years, it truly bit the dust. Power supply overheated and surged the motherboard. It was one that I’ve been upgrading over time but other parts were starting to fail. So, it’s time for a replacement. I’ll still be doing my articles, and doing the D&D patron campaign, and Saturday campaign. But, it will be from a much older laptop. It sucks, but until I can set aside $1500 for a replacement computer that will properly handle the streaming demand I’m going to be putting on it, this will have to do. (Once I get it, I can finally pursue streaming games, more D&D, and help videos as I had wanted to with my old rig that just couldn’t take the stress.)

Edit; If you would like to help support getting the new rig, you can donate to us directly here: http://bit.ly/1Ea5BKX  If you have something you wanna say, leave a comment and I’ll read them during our Saturday night campaign!

Player Help – Dungeon Delving

There are plenty of how to guides on combat strategy, but not so much when it comes to the art of dungeoneering. Look no further, for this guide should get you back on track and hammering through the depths, ruins, caves, crypts, and sewers in no time!

Preventing a Stale Campaign

I’m currently fifteen weeks into my latest campaign. To give you an idea, it is an epic fantasy campaign where tarrasques can breed and are commonplace. The characters have hit level nine, and eagerly look forward to every new session. I’ve learned a few tricks, and picked up on a few things, that help me make sure that the players are always looking forward to the next session. I do my best to make sure that each session has something for everyone. I hope this guide helps keep your campaign fresh and exciting for your players!

Building a New Campaign “Rise” – Part 5 – Things EVERYWHERE!

I look before me and try to figure out where to go next with my campaign preparation. Scattered about my desk is the aftermath of a storm which has left a flurry of small memo pad pages, sticky notes, legal pad pages, and things I don’t even remember doing. My computer desktop is riddled with inspirational images, sketches, doodles, map ideas, and the past four articles’ worth of information. “Well, things are a little cluttered.” I tell myself. I lost control of the beast that is my next project, and it’s time to get back on track, fine tune, and revise.

Building a New Campaign “Rise” – Part 4 – 1st Session & Beyond

One thing I like to do before finishing the heavy detailing of my campaigns and campaign worlds, is get the first adventure planned, and the events shortly after fleshed out. I typically do a prequel session. A session where everyone has a chance to get used to things and learn what their lives were like before the campaign gets underway. I did this great effect in my Prime campaigns where the first session was simply letting the players live out their everyday lives as level zero characters. So, technically the adventure I am planning for an example is not the first session, but the second. I just want to avoid potential spoilers!