The Active Set Tale

We talk about the wonders you can find in the background of a scene. From the rolling conveyor belts of a factory to the people in a bar the extras you bring to the scene in description will be paid back in fun for your whole table. Continue reading “The Active Set Tale”

The Inspiration Tale

We talk about where we get some ideas for campaigns and characters, giving special thought to how to turn movies into Age of Rebellion Campaigns. Continue reading “The Inspiration Tale”

Eyes Up: The Story Thrust

There is a concept that I’ve seen with GMs and systems that can lead to a muddied role playing experience. This is a gaping problem I’ve found with what’s become called on the podcast and elsewhere as Session Zero. Using these systems and methods we can create vibrant settings for our players to interact with and there can be a multitude of options for what story element gets spun into the narrative that moves the group forward. Continue reading “Eyes Up: The Story Thrust”

Eyes Up: GM Focus

As a player I’ve seen many GMs get distracted by the seeming whims of a player. The plot wanders all over until the GM finally gets inspiration and starts asserting their creative direction on the narrative. It isn’t enough to come up with a setting and then thrust players together to get moving themselves, as a GM you’re at the table to provide guidance and narrative shove to the player characters. Continue reading “Eyes Up: GM Focus”

Eyes Up: Preparation

I’m an improvising GM. I know that this hurts my games in some ways, but I work to even these issues out. I’ll go through my preparation stages to give a few windows into how I work out what happens in a session as well as how some of my bad habits can be overcome by other methods of pre planning. Continue reading “Eyes Up: Preparation”

Eyes Up: Where the Heck are We Going?

My name is Ben, and I’m a GM. There isn’t a way on this planet that you could get me to change this.

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Confessions of a Newb GM: Skills and Structured Events

I want to help clear up a misconception that I’ve seen again and again in discussions. Skills are skills. It doesn’t matter if they’re knowledge skills, combat skills, bow hunting skills, or computer hacking skills it all comes back down to: The way you use a skill in one situation is the same as in any other situation. Continue reading “Confessions of a Newb GM: Skills and Structured Events”

Confessions of a Newb GM: The Fuzzy Future

You’ve read GM sections so you know preparation is the key to a successful session, you’ve probably heard this in regards to almost everything. For a newer GM it’s true. Preparation ahead of time means having the depth of knowledge to react to a party that wants to go anywhere but the nice little path that you have lain before them. Continue reading “Confessions of a Newb GM: The Fuzzy Future”

Confessions of a Newb GM: Calmly Adventuring

An RPG is about people telling a communal story and having fun while doing it. If all that people do is get together to get in fights and kill things there is Warmachine or that other, more expensive, one. Players and GMs get the fun of a common goal that they work towards, the players slowly chipping away, up and down action, the GMs frantically trying to spin a story from whatever cliché they can think up in that moment. The putty to fill in the gaps between expectations and what is delivered comes from everyone buying into the premise of having fun together doing the same thing. This is the same reason why people get together to do various sports with friends, play board games, play cards, watch movies, or even just to have a few drinks together.

The difference with RPGs is that while there is a game, there are also roles to play; I mean it is right there on the book jacket. During setup everyone gets their role, depending on their desired outlooks for the game: the face, the muscle, the tinkerer, the sneaker, the mob of other people. This make up requires communication. If you’re playing a random Lord of the Rings derivative RPG and your players all have fighters, as the GM you shouldn’t spend time with a with a rogue based sneaky portion to save the party from a massive fight. Everyone ends up feeling frustrated at not being able to use their fun abilities.

To help facilitate group creation the GM can give an elevator pitch for what type of adventure is going to be happening. Even a list of a few movies or books you’re going to riff on is a good idea. A blank page can lead to anything, one person wanting to do cowboy horror and the next to create a werewolf teen basketball star, guidance is needed. Everyone sitting down at the table needs to say what their intentions are for their character.

The Long Campaign

As has been said before a miss-matched group of characters leads to inevitable headaches. I normally want to talk over with the players ahead of time what sort of campaign we all want. I may have my own ideas for the campaign, but I may be spurred on by a cool idea that a player has.

Party creation can be done in its own session and usually it helps with setting expectations for everyone. If it’s with old friends it allows for a nice relaxing time, if it’s with new people you can size everyone up and the emergence of a table leader starts to happen. This isn’t throwing away a session. You’re gathering ideas and honing them into a larger notion of where you’re going with it. It allows for the players to decide what they’re taking and to make sure that any particularly visible holes can be dealt with.

The holes matter in a long campaign, especially if you as the GM want to play around in one of the areas that the players are weak in.

Party balance is a weird beast depending on the RPG system you’re in. If you’re in a more narrative system where people are able to do pretty much anything and it’s the story that matters it isn’t as crucial. With narrative games it does still matter when considering the “odd one out.”

When I was in the playtest of @Fiddlebacks Mask of Ordo (a great module, I cannot recommend it more) we had two to three combat orientated people and a sneaker, the GM tried to let the sneaker get ahead and do stealthy things, but the rest of us didn’t let him because it wasn’t in our character’s natures.

If you’re in one of the d20 alum games it matters an amazing amount. If you are chronically without a healer that means slower going due to natural healing, no one to control the enemies for more than a round, and your damage dealers are having to evade without dealing damage. Not enough damage dealers and the fights take too long and people get bored.

One Quick Shot

One shot adventures are a completely different beast, whether it’s at a convention or wanting to try out something new. These don’t always require a balanced party, as @wood-jasond rightly points out, but it depends on what people are trying to do with it. You need to be aware of the experience you want and what you’re trying to accomplish. Is it a convention game with a bunch of hardened players for the system? Are you doing pregen characters? Can that adventure be used to welcome new people to it? Do you really want to do that one and only time you GM a zombie adventure now?

Making sure you know what you want out of the adventure allows you to give the players an idea of what is coming up and how it will affect them. Knowledge of the adventure paths allows you to also decide if player party balance matters to you or if it’s more advantageous to have a completely tilted play group. Can three fighters and a mage slay that dragon or does it need to have the rogue and cleric as well?

Adventuring Together

I’ve gone through my two types of adventure thinking here for both campaigns and one shots. I hope it helps with figuring out how much you want to know about the party before starting to plan an adventure. Planning ahead is wonderful for a campaign, but a series of independent adventures that focuses on each player can  allow for greater enjoyment.

The Villains Tale

David’s back to talk about villains with us and how to make them just the big bad nemesis for your players to knock over.

We go from Babylon 5 to Die Hard for examples and many places in between.

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The Tale of Crisis

Ben likes breaking things and making the players figure out how to fix them.

Joshua is leery, but offers some great advice for how to deal with having crisis in your game and making them interesting.

Continue reading “The Tale of Crisis”

The Strongholds Tale

Joshua and Ben have the book Strongholds of Resistance and give their reviews. David leads questions and joins in with his thoughts. We all talk about how to bring this book into making your tales on the table all the more awesome.

Continue reading “The Strongholds Tale”

The Underused Tale

Why is astrogation only used to pull those levers for hyperspace? Can you use knowledge skills in the heat of the moment? Can deception be just as good as range (light) in combat? We look at all of these and more in this weeks episode.

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Episode 64 – The Coercive Tale

We talk about coercion and the use of the skill at the table.

Joshua is away and one of my players was looking at the blackmail talent, so David and I had a discussion on how to use it, how it’s been used in movies and ways to improve its effectiveness.

Continue reading “Episode 64 – The Coercive Tale”

The Ascendant NPC Tale

This week we talk about Rivals, Minions, and Nemesis characters and how the different power levels change the way you want to use them.

We also talk about how to take an NPC from the lowly minion who runs away from the PCs and transform them into  a truly terrifying nemesis later.

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The Binding Tale

We talk about Bind, Protect/Unleash, and Battle meditation in this episode.

We give the High-Powered abilities a look to see how they can be misused by GMs and to see how they can be used to tell amazing stories.

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The Core of Destiny Tale

We talk about the Force and Destiny Core book.

The book is finally out, and we have a few things to say, and to praise. We go from motivation to morality, from the GM section to the specializations, and we don’t just have a little fun with it.

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The Tale of Hiring Guns

Hired Guns are a huge pillar of Edge of the Empire. One of the six careers. But, the basis behind how you can make the most of them is not quite as easy as it sounds. We dive into the career and find some people who help bring the nasty pain to their opponents and how you can make an even better one.

Continue reading “The Tale of Hiring Guns”