Travis Miller's Blog About Sword & Sorcery Fiction and Classic Fantasy Adventure Gaming
Many experienced roleplaying gamers ignore the section of a roleplaying game's core rule book titled "What is a roleplaying game?" Some games don't include that section at all. Most likely, you already know basically how this game works. Swords & Wizardry Complete With the popularity of D&D and actual play videos on the internet, a …
Continue reading Why I Read the “What is a RPG?” Section Of a RPG Book
Starting game masters often build too much of their world before their campaign starts. Too much world building can produce a lot of stuff that players never engage with in play. It can make it hard to use material I find after the campaign starts because I'll have to revise elements of my world or …
Continue reading How I Do Worldbuilding For My Sandbox Campaigns
I had an enjoyable conversation with Kevin of the Redcaps Podcast earlier this week. One of the questions he asked me was where I would recommend someone looks for conversation about tabletop role-playing games online. I had to work through the question before I found an answer. The question has stuck in my mind for …
One of the debates I see pop up on social media from time to time is "Low Prep Vs. High Prep." Some say you should do as little as possible and improvise because players are going to do things you don't expect anyway. Others say you should do as much as possible so that you …
Continue reading Where Do I Fall in the Low Prep Vs High Prep Debate?
How much backstory and history do I make for my sandbox campaigns?
There are some basic elements of story that are helpful for a game master to know. This post is about those elements and why games and stories share them.
In last week's post I wrote about how random generation tables have some uses but they also have some drawbacks. The biggest drawback I find is that the tables created by other GMs or designers often have assumptions and contexts that don't fit whatever campaign setting I'm running. The major drawback of random generation tables. …
Continue reading How Do I Create Random Generation Tables for a Sandbox Campaign?
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