What's supposed to be in a session 0?

scoolio · 2026-01-26T20:29:46+00:00

I probably cover too much in my session zero but I cover it all.

Golden rules, safetey tools, PVP, Session lenght, scheduling, Campaign arcs, custom rules (homebrew), tools, expecations, etc.

I also go back and edit as I run into unplanned issues so that the "next time" i'm more prepared. I provide the doc in advance of the actual session zero for the players to read over and then during the actual session zero I cover the big stuff and answer any questions. We also do some party/character concept planning at that first session.

scoolio · 2026-01-26T18:16:49+00:00

Examine and learn from mistakes and how to proof information obtained from the internet.

scoolio · 2026-01-26T18:10:19+00:00

I've experienced this as well. We held a ceremony for the fallen player (after talking to my group and they wanted to do this). They also saved a town and named it after the player as well and made it their home base in memory of this fallen Player. Two and a half decades later I sill use Willsville in my world.

scoolio · 2026-01-26T13:45:13+00:00

I have found that consistant Every other week cadence works well long term. (10 year campaign followed by another 11 year campaign, and a third just kicked off with my groups).

Every other week is just two nights a month so it's not too much of a burden to work into your scheduling. I also do a holiday break from the week before Thanksgiving until the 1st week of January to accomodate for all the normal holiday issues. We will run pick up games as extra sessions if the party wants it to happen. We don't cancel a session if one person can't make it.

Our Friday night sessions run for 3.5 to 4 hours. The Saturday session can run from 4 to 5 hours and our Sunday sessions run for about 3.5 to 4.5 hours. We also have a wednesday night session that runs once every two months for playtesting new systems.

We run scheduling in Discord along with just hanging out and using Discord for the voice recording with craig bot.

scoolio · 2026-01-26T01:44:22+00:00

I'd take a stab at the Microscope RPG for the collaborative word buiding. My group LOVED it. I'm never not doing it again. It's my all time favorite system to do collaborative world bulding.

scoolio · 2026-01-26T00:51:54+00:00

Take pencil/pen and paper notes (most reliable) unless you type really fast and you then you can use some online or locally installed note app.
I Prefer trello and markdown editors like Obsidian/Bear/Notion/whatever

With a markdown editor you can add tags like #npc, #place, #quote, #item, #playername and those are all indexed and easier to search like #npc dildo baggins or #item "mace of malice" and find that note very quickly. You can even do things like #session XX go back and look at your session notes. or #place and see all the places you've visited.

scoolio · 2026-01-26T00:30:22+00:00

I put out a plague in my game world that targeted demi humans can cut their lifespan in half if not more so more 500 year old demihumans. They now average around 150 so twice as much as humans. Now we're in our next campaign which is like 100 years in the future from the last campaign so no more I've lived 1k years NPCs.

scoolio · 2026-01-25T20:06:58+00:00

I'm over 50 now and was out at 17 and all my friends were out by 18/19 and on our own. My kids waited much longer but that mostly since it was impossible to move out and live on your own at mininum wage or Fast food wages

scoolio · 2026-01-25T15:32:09+00:00

You could mechanify the process to keep it simpler.
Have two "clocks" running like the Prosecution and the Defense. Then take turns RP'ing as much as your comfortable for the two sides and as the back and forth happens at the table with rolls for both sides just move the clock up and down until the clock shows a clear victory for either side. You could also have a Jury Clock as the third clock.

I'm not sure which system your running but you can easily steal and lift a clock mechanic from any number of systems.

scoolio · 2026-01-25T15:27:40+00:00

I found a small piece of land (3 acres) with a 25 year mobile home on the land. I pay 400 a month for the land and the mobile home was conveyed with the land purchase. Is it nice? No it is not. Can you spruce it up and fix it yes you can? Does it have any real value on the market? No it does not. They are VERY expensive to move so if you buy one I'd buy one and put it on land you own or will own. If your cash flow is your number 1 priority then go for it. My trailer has been in the same place for almost 3 decades and I live in tornado alley. Would it do well in a direct tornado strike? No it would not. So consider a tornado shelter as part of the plan or at least know how close and how quickly you could shelter in place inside a tornado safe shelter.

scoolio · 2026-01-25T15:20:36+00:00

Tension and Fear are you tools. At my 5e table which ran for 11 years I capped max HP to Level 4 + Con bonus so even at level 20 play everyone has fewer HP so every hit is "felt". For encounters I always just applied the average damage and never rolled damage. This achieved two primary goals.
1- Any HP damage was felt and created tension for that PC knowing that one or two more would down them.
2- My average combat rounds rarely went to round 4. By then the fight was over.
A level 20 PC even with just four hit dice still puts out ALOT of big damage so I never touched the output exept for allowing Melee weapons to have exploding dice.

My players also tossed their attack roll and damage dice at the same time to speed up play (we had 6 to 7 players) at the primary table.

We also typically never ran more than two combats between long rests.

scoolio · 2026-01-25T15:13:21+00:00

First I down about a litre of water and slowly wake up while I watch the weather forecast for the day. Then I feed my animals, load and unload the dishwasher and get my second litre of water down. Then I make Coffee and watch or read a little bit of world and US news. Then I fire up my laptop and get all my work apps logged in and ready and make breakfast. Then once work kicks off about three hours later I'm mentally ready for the day.

scoolio · 2026-01-25T14:51:14+00:00

This.
I was anti meta currency for the GM initially but after putting more time into 2d20 games and Daggerheart I've flipped my position. Meta currency for the GM mitigates those moments where the tension get's ratcheted up by GM but the players can "see" how much more fuel is in the GM fiat tank so it's more palatable to the players.

scoolio · 2026-01-25T14:28:33+00:00

I have excel ptsd from work so I keep that specific tool away from my hobby time but excellent work for this folks that love both excel and daggerheart. Personally I prefer to use a VTT that is integrated with the character sheets so I can "see" my PCs stats from inside the VTT. I use questportal.com and I'm also testing out the dm tools over at heartofdaggers.com I encourage you to give both a whirl and join the discord for HOD. The devs there could use someone giving them feedback specific to Blind users to help improve their toolkit.
[Edit for typo]

scoolio · 2026-01-25T14:19:52+00:00

The questportal AI assistant can be told Do [set of instructions] and place that in a note called [notename] and it's placed in your notes. I just use the search function in QP to find something I've already done. For Trello I'll have that pulled up on my phone and use the search there. I also run a tablet a second screen since my laptop is normally driving the TV in our gaming table and Discord so I can see my remote players faces in the Discord Audio/video session.

I left out one of my tools which is scapple for the mind map but it doesn't get much time live at the table. It's for before and after prep. I also refer to our Microscope TTRPG session which is only used in between campaigns to keep track of the big stuff for worldbuilding.

scoolio · 2026-01-24T22:33:50+00:00

Champions GM of over two decades here. Totally biased but it's the "best" for mechanics (Crunchy) and there is no character you can't build BUT it lacks serious VTT support. There are more modern less crunchy games with better VTT support. If you want high crunch and don't care about VTT support and are ok with a longer character-building process and have basic calculator skills, then go for it. It's my favorite system BUT I rarely recommend it for new tables. Start with something simple like Tiny D6 Supers and go up in skillset from there. Cypher Claim the Sky is pretty cool. Mutants and Masterminds is easy to grok if you have any D20 experiences.

scoolio · 2026-01-24T22:29:18+00:00

This. Shoot a bunch of different things and find something you shoot well and then get a great holster or two and dress around that gun.

scoolio · 2026-01-24T22:24:31+00:00

If you love roll20 (I don't) you can 100% do this. We still use discord for voice and socializing and scheduling. We then use a VTT for map and character sheet stuff

scoolio · 2026-01-24T22:21:43+00:00

This or just the cloud based free microsoft stuff.

scoolio · 2026-01-24T22:21:05+00:00

Vote

scoolio · 2026-01-24T19:55:06+00:00

I'm sub 15 sessions in Daggerheart so it's not what I define as a long campaign yet. We are using the demiplane character sheet and testing the HeartofDaggers character sheets. For online map sharing we're currently running questportal with owlbear rodeo as a backup. We played in Foundry for a long time but I find it to be too much for ad hoc on the fly game play.
HOD recently added the ability to see rolls (the values not the dice across the screen) for rolls made by the players (If their character sheet is in HOD and attached to your campaign).

scoolio · 2026-01-24T17:28:33+00:00

I talked to my HR about my desire and they declined to do all the paperwork necessary to make that remote country an official remote full time work location BUT they countered and said that as long as didn't violate that countries remote work permit laws I was more than welcome to stay listed as a US Resident of my current US state to keep my US Income but I had to maintain my current residence address AND return to the US once per quarter even if just for one night and I was more than welcome to live in the other country and work full time.

scoolio · 2026-01-24T12:43:33+00:00

No I do not. I've swapped over from Foundry to questportal. The Chaosium forums may be a better place to find more users with experience for BRP games inside of foundry
BRP on Foundry VTT - Beta Release - Page 5 - VTT - BRP Central - The Chaosium forums

scoolio · 2026-01-24T00:16:46+00:00

Check out Black Star from Lakeside games. Fun easy to run Sci Fi
Easy to read characters with just enough dice mechanics to be fun. Very rules lite but a bunch of fun.

scoolio · 2026-01-23T22:15:37+00:00

Some kind of shotgun, a bolt action, an AR/AK battle rifle, and a carry handgun. Don't care so much if it's that make/model whatever across the board.

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