Tag: Houserules

Running a Successful Campaign: Tips & Tricks for Week 6

Weekly Tip/Trick for Friday, September 28, 2012 Remember the Books are Just Guidelines – One thing that kept me from becoming a DM at first was a limited understanding of the rules.  You don’t need to know every rule to run a game.  The way I like to look at it is to think of …

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Running a Successful Campaign: Tips & Tricks for Week 5

Weekly Tip/Trick for Friday, September 21, 2012 Try to Get the Players Invested in Your Game – This is a crucial step in motivating players to keep coming back!  Think of it this way, you are 100% committed to your campaign, that’s obvious, but the players start out 0% committed to it.  The idea is …

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The Random-izer

The Random-izer The First thing you need to know about the Random-izer is that I, Michael AKA-Mumbles, roll 2d20’s for everything when I play. I haven’t “always” done this, but I have done it for a very long time.  Psychologically I think my dice roll better when I do this. I always use two different …

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Running a Successful Campaign: Tips & Tricks for Week 4

Weekly Tip/Trick for Friday, September 14, 2012:    Keep it Simple – Another way to burn out players is by over complicating things.  One thing that has frustrated me in the past is when DM’s create these huge elaborate mazes/puzzles that take the group FOREVER to solve.  If the group is spending hours relying on the …

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Running a Successful Campaign: Tips & Tricks for Week 3

Weekly Tip/Trick for Friday, September 7, 2012:    3.  Think Ahead– This may sound like an obvious one, but keep in mind, players don’t know everything that you know.  Don’t expect players to figure out something just because the answer is simple or right in front of them.  You also can’t expect players to remember everything …

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Dungeon Talk Episode 5: More than Necessary

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Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 56:33 — 51.8MB)Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSSMichael and I took vacations and just got back this week so we recorded and will resume our weekly game this Monday.  We had another guest with us this week.  His name is Jared and he recently joined …

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Running a Successful Campaign: Tips & Tricks for Week 2

Weekly Tip/Trick for Friday, August 31, 2012:    Have a Contingency Plan – The best advice anyone has ever given me, when it comes to running games, was to always have a contingency plan.  This could be anything from a random NPC (non-playable character) you create, to a surprise encounter.  I used to play with a …

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Running a Successful Campaign: Tips & Tricks

Weekly Tip/Trick for August 24, 2012:  Introduction When I first started running games, no one really gave me any useful tips or general rules of thumb to go by.  All I had were the books and my own creativity.  Although the books help, they can also create headaches and overwhelm those new to running games …

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Dungeon Talk Episode 4: A New Home

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Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 58:41 — 53.7MB)Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | RSSWell here we are at our new home.  The first 9 or 10 minutes is Michael discussing what happened with the old website and why we decided to move.  The first topic begins after that.  We also have …

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House Rule: Hero Points

Hero Points: Let’s be clear, these are almost identical to Action points from 3.5 Eberron. I’ve said in other posts and on the podcasts that the Eberron setting is my favorite. And it’s not even close. I LOVE that setting. Everything about it just feels right to me, including the Action Point mechanic it introduced. …

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