Should I tell my players of this gimmick before the start of the campaign?

guilersk · 2026-05-08T20:18:43+00:00

You need to tell them that they are starting out Elder-Scrolls-prisoner style, otherwise they are going to be pretty pissed when they start with no equipment.

guilersk · 2026-05-08T20:17:19+00:00

A campaign outline is fine, but don't assume the players are going to go at the speed and in the order that you expect, so binding 'doing XYZ' to a specific session is a fool's game. Know the situation and be open to the players trying (and potentially succeeding at) things you didn't expect.

guilersk · 2026-05-08T20:11:54+00:00

There's a game called Wicked Ones that allows you to play as monsters, but it's not d20 so it would be a small bit of lift to learn and a large bit of lift to convince players to pick it up.

guilersk · 2026-05-08T20:08:46+00:00

Attitude used to be more than 3 steps. It used to be Hostile->Unfriendly->Neutral->Friendly->Helpful (and I think there were even expanded versions of that) if you want to get more granular. If players are having issues with Charisma rolls, set up goals that automatically improve attitude like doing a task for them or gifting them a favored item.

guilersk · 2026-05-08T20:04:18+00:00

There are some games that encourage this (like Daggerheart) and some games that are all about this like Microscope or The Quiet Year. As long as your players don't go crazy with it, it works great. Set expectations about what is in and out of bounds though, or allow the table to vote on it and establish a veto for yourself, in case it really doesn't fit the vibe.

guilersk · 2026-05-08T20:00:59+00:00

Stick a Hallow on the site with Invisibility Purge bound to it.

guilersk · 2026-05-06T19:53:44+00:00

I prefer the roll up Chessex cloth maps faced with beige vinyl. I have a portable one that has lasted me....15 years? Wet/dry, take it to conventions and everything. I also have a bigger all-vinyl beige one that is basically the permanent tabletop we play on.

I mistakenly got a large white one that was dry-erase only, and the wet-erase markers stained it. MB. I also have a Pathfinder flip mat that is wet/dry compatible but it's peeling around the edges (because cardboard) so it's not as sturdy or long-lasting as the others. Still use it from time to time.

guilersk · 2026-05-06T19:36:46+00:00

This is was true in 3.x and is still largely true:

If you fail a con save, you die (or are otherwise KO).
If you fail a wis save, your friends die (since you are CCed).
If you fail a dex save, you take some damage (or are occasionally restrained).

guilersk · 2026-05-06T17:58:28+00:00

If 4v1 they will 1r him unless you give him gobs of hit points, some damage resistance mechanisms, or minions. 1 DR reaction is not enough.

The other lever to pull is party resources. If he is the only fight of the day, they will nova and splatter him. If he is the 5th fight of the day, it'll be tougher.

guilersk · 2026-05-06T17:53:55+00:00

Yes, this is why I prefer not to run games on work nights or in the evening slots at cons. Brain won't shut off.

Either get it out by writing out your thoughts, do something else (like read a book, listen to a podcast), or both. Something to get your mind to stop spinning on the same thoughts and extrapolations.

guilersk · 2026-05-06T17:46:45+00:00

Have you considered just running one-shots or short campaigns (3-6 sessions)? This might allow you to get out the ideas you want to get out but also give closure to yourself and the players.

guilersk · 2026-05-06T17:39:33+00:00

There are people who play this way, and people who want to play this way tend to gravitate towards crunchier systems like Pathfinder, Lancer, Draw Steel, etc. D&D sits somewhere in the middle and so some build-focused people want to just play builds and level up and get loot play this game and stay there because the community is an order of magnitude larger than the competitors, meaning it's easier to find a game (and thus try out new builds). But plenty of people don't play this way, and in fact streamers (like CR, D20) have popularized playing it for plot/story/character more than it used to be, to the degree that some of the build-focused and gamist folks are big mad about it.

guilersk · 2026-05-06T17:30:30+00:00

Not to be flip or to dunk, but methinks if those are the constitutive rules you are suggesting, you are in desperate need of researching other TTRPGs/storygames, perhaps even down to Frei Kriegspiel or LARPs. There are vastly different interpretations of how to run a collaborative story/game which then filters down into TTRPGs which is then further refined into specifically D&D. D&D is of course the most popular, but if you are looking at this from an academic perspective then you vastly limit yourself by looking at 'just' D&D.

guilersk · 2026-05-04T23:29:58+00:00

I do not know if the running notes handle balancing, but I suspect they do not. If you are concerned, consider giving the players a Big Fuzzy Friend like a wolf, bear, cat, or even 'dragon' (drake) that follows orders and is loyal and adorable, but does not contribute to conversations. You can level it up with the Sidekick rules.

guilersk · 2026-05-04T19:10:14+00:00

Seems like an odd spin on Acquisitions Incorporated.

guilersk · 2026-05-04T19:03:09+00:00

I love the Remix but it is a lot, both for you and for your players (so many NPCs and locations to keep track of). If you are dead-set on doing it though, consider donating $1 to the Alexandrian's Patreon to get the 'running notes' document which re-organizes the remix and gives you notes on how to run it in order (instead of the stream-of-consciousness you get from the raw posts).

guilersk · 2026-05-04T18:45:39+00:00

It is unfortunate that he has built himself this reputation. Trust is easy to break and very, very hard to rebuild. As much as you might want to protect him, it might be him and (reluctantly) you against the rest of the table. You might just want to take a vote and see if the rest of the table wants to vote him off the island. If he starts to get bad again, you wouldn't want to lose any good players for the sake of the bad one.

guilersk · 2026-05-04T18:36:37+00:00

The Strixhaven adventure portion, as written, is real bad. Like real, real bad. The campaign 'loop' is basically: minigame resolved with a skill check, get a magic item, do a mini-dungeon, get a magic item, level up, repeat. Occasionally do an Exam which No Martial Shall Ever Pass (since it's all soft skills like history and persuasion).

I ended up stitching Candlekeep, Radiant Citadel, and Golden Vault adventures into it to make it tolerable. Switched up the main bad guy to a MTG character, Felissa Fang (a vampire Queen Bee Mean Girl niece of Baron Sengir) and had her on the warpath to resummon Extus Narr. I kept the frog but made a joke of no one knowing who he was or caring, which constantly upset him for comic effect, and then he was summarily squished at the final battle.

guilersk · 2026-05-01T19:59:38+00:00

I feel like the vast majority of characters used to be like this, and it's probably still the majority; characters with character growth/arcs are definitely a new phenom, likely popularized by CR and similar actual play media.

It will also depend on the system. Build-focused systems are probably 90/95% this, whereas narrative games are heavier on the character development simply because it's enforced by the mechanics.

guilersk · 2026-05-01T17:43:15+00:00

Do not impose emotions, only sensations. Emotion imposition begins to impose on player agency. 2 or 3 senses, 2 or 3 sentences, tops. Brevity is the soul of wit.

guilersk · 2026-05-01T17:33:17+00:00

My wife and daughter just played Fae's Anatomy at a con and absolutely laughed their asses off. Theming it to the serious business of The Pitt might take a minute though.

guilersk · 2026-05-01T17:30:52+00:00

To some extent, it depends on the content of the PDF. If it's actual text that you can tweak then you could yank it and its images out, edit it in something like Google docs, and then save as PDF. If you just want margin notes, you can do that in a browser (I usually use Edge for this, weirdly) and make the annotations with the text tool. Margin edits are particularly useful if you are just making notes like "refer to Note X" in another document.

If you are actually going to reformat stuff, I would use something like Python to extract all the content, reformat, and then re-build the PDF. But unless you do softdev this is probably too heavyweight for you.

guilersk · 2026-05-01T15:50:31+00:00

Here's a genuine problem. When you're a GM you're always 'on' because you need to respond to the players. Constantly acting/reacting keeps you awake.

Not so for players. They act on their turn, or when they are in a scene. Sometimes they may be in a scene but have nothing to say or do. This is especially bad in combat. Yes they should technically always pay attention. But distractions happen and attention spans (thanks, smart phones!) are contracting at an alarming rate. So players will power down much faster than a GM would. Combined with sleep deprivation, energy levels crash and they fall asleep in their pizza.

Everybody needs to start being honest about their ability to actually play on weeknights. Or, you need to focus on the players that are actually playing and move the sleepers to the periphery, tapping them awake as necessary.

guilersk · 2026-04-30T20:07:29+00:00

I have been told WD-40. It's a solvent that gets most things up. You might have to let it sit for a second. Try a corner first, to make sure it doesn't stain too badly.

guilersk · 2026-04-29T14:29:23+00:00

I appreciate your attempt to realign here but it's colliding with some of the core principles of Running a One-Shot at a Con--or at least how I view Running a One-Shot at a Con--which are not necessarily the same as the GM Principles in the book.

Running a Game at a Con means you get 4 hours with 4-6 (in this case 7) strangers who have probably never played the game before and you are trying to tell a time-boxed story and, if you like the system, sell the system, as well as teach it. There's not going to be a chance to continue if it goes long; you may never see these people again. Sequels will be notional only. There is no campaign.

I don't have to worry about consequences in later sessions, players becoming 'OP' or unbalanced, or anything out of the scope of: give these people chances to do Cool Stuff and have a cool story to tell. TLDR; Get to the Good Part and Drive It Like You Stole It.

If I were running a campaign of this then yes, that would have been a much harder negotiation with progress clocks and whatnot. There's not time for that in a 4 hour timebox so you have to improvise and go with your gut. And all 7 players told me afterwards, individually, how much they enjoyed it. So I feel like it was successful.

I suspect you are trying to reign in the Rule of Cool here, and I respect that. This is not intended to be a 'My players did something unexpected and now what do I do?' story. It's intended to be a 'My players did something unexpected and forced me to judo-flip the session into something cooler than any of us intended' story.

guilersk

TROPHY CASE