Ask Game Masters

Hello AGM!

My players have not encountered each other, but are engaged in their own individual plots. At some point, I'd like them to be a part of the same colony, without forcing it (IE get them to becoming a "party" and working together).

I think I've hit a point where each group needs something from the other:

• Group 1 has safety and weapons, but no food
• Group 2 has safety and food, but no weapons
• Group 3 has food and weapons, but no safety

This setup was entirely on accident, but I think it will lead to them all running into each other for different reasons.

At this point, should I just airdrop hints that the other group(s) have what they need? Or how can I get to the end goal of unification?

The Zombie TTRPG is a homebrew that I made, rules are here:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1RA-EjXm6qTo3BljSlnrYvqKnGVrDAJuI6epC7aassP4/edit?usp=sharing

If you need any additional info, ask away.

Hi, everyone, thank you for your time.

There is a ton of info on how to run modules or steal ideas and encounters from them. However, I am looking for advice on the exact opposite and haven't had any luck.

The question in short:

How do I go about writing published adventures for other people to pick up and run? What info is necessary, what info is unnecessary, and what is just distracting?

Tangential background:

In my decade of GMing I have used a published adventure exactly once - it was an awful experience, nothing went to plan, and I felt much more prepared than I actually was. I have never done it since.

However, I am currently writing my own ttrpg system. It's going along great but before I even think about promoting an alpha release, I want to create a "Pick up and play" set - including basic, pre-created character archetypes and an adventure/mission, so you could jump in and try it out whenever.

I usually throw my players into a sandbox and plan every session individually to avoid burnout and to play my own little strategy game, if you will. That type of preparation just does not work when I'm trying to give someone else a prerendered package.

So I'm turning to the hive mind:

• What's the info you would be looking for when running published adventures(, module campaigns, what have you)?
• Which parts are often given but you almost always ignore anyways?
• Which parts are just distracting and make you feel like nothing is going to plan, or even cause your players to often go "off rails"?

I'm not looking to write a whole campaign - I'm aiming for a mission of around two sessions, just in case that's important to someone's advice.

As always, any nudge is appreciated. Thank you in advance.

I'm curious about your opinions on this topic.

All scenarios I've run so far have had a minimum of discrimination. (Religious/racist prejudice only against those that were actually fanatic/inherently evil. 'Race' as in 'species', not colour of skin or whatevs.) But I've been wondering what can be done with it as a feature of a RPG world or factions within it. In which cases does discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation, religion etc. make for 'good' story elements, so 'good' that it's worth to actually implement despite it being a horrible thing by design? Granted that all players agree beforehand.

The other thing are (especially historical) terror methods. Again the question: What would justify to use such elaborate cruelty in a fictional setting? This came up when I thought about using aspects of the 'Zersetzung' ('disruption'/'decomposition') in a game as part of the BBEG's tactics. ('Zersetzung' was a catalogue of terror methods applied on people that were deemed oppositional in the German Democratic Republic.) I dropped the idea when I spoke to my players about it and one of them expressed discomfort about potentially having this done to their PC.

Both questions could also be differentiated between entirely fictional settings and those that explicitly try to recreate the life in a stage of real-world history.

Thanks in advance for your input, please be respectful.

Edit: Another distinction that could be made: If used, should discrimination/terror always serve to emphasize someone's evil nature, or could it sometimes be 'rightfully' presented as morally ambiguous as well?

My D&De campaign wrapped up at level 20 after five years of regular play, and we are playing some one shots and stuff as a break before we decide what to do next. The D&D DM volunteered to GM again.

I think it's only fair that we players try to run some games to give the GM a break! I played in a FFG Edge of the Empire game for a few weeks many years ago with a different bunch, and had a great time. I bought the beginner box, which has four characters built, maps, an adventure, and the infernal dice. We will have five players, but one of our members played in my previous game so he can probably re-use his old char.

It's a fairly interactive system, requiring creativity from the players and GM to use the Advantages and Disadvantages in cinematic ways. I'm hopeful this bunch can do it. I didn't think any of them were particular Star Wars nerds, but I can keep Wookipedia open if I need background info on aliens or something.

Any tips for a new GM running through a beginner module, or on adapting this game for an extra player (might just NOT), or in running EotE in general?

Thanks in advance.

This system is really cool, but it seems like not that many people are playing it. I think the name "suited" is probably not helping the matter... While clever, it makes it kinda hard to google.

It's somewhat of a "rules-lite" type, with all the pros and cons that come with that. One of those cons being that most things are sort of up to the GM's judgement, and I am very new to GMing. With a lot of other similarly rules-lite systems, there's a community offering their experiences and things they found helpful. Suited doesn't seem to have much of that, but maybe some people here have played it and would like to share?

Hey there, I'm new to PF2E, but not to GMing. Played PF1, shadowrun, star wars, 40k etc. etc.

I've done a bit of Trouble Under Otari just to get used to the system and give the players a base to work out from.

The big campaign I'm running is Abomination Vaults. I got the module on foundry and have skimmed it and will run it.

I have a barbarian, bard, wizard, gunslinger and NPC rogue for the party.

Any suggestions or tips for what's ahead? As mentioned, I haven't run pathfinder before and I'm leaving it to the players to know their class and feats etc. but it'll be nice to know if anyone else who has run this module says what to look out for. My players are all adults and communicative so no hostile shennenigans are expected.

Edit: Any tips for actually running PF2E appreciated too!

Hey everyone! Let's try to get some more activity in here. I was wondering what kind of rulers you have all created. I realize most medieval settings will probably have a monarch rule the lands, but this does not have to be the case. So, what kind of governing systems have you created in your worlds?

I'll start off as I am making the post. My players are in an archipelago divided into five inhabited sections. One of them excersizes a system I have dubbed "Elected Sacrificial Monarchy." Bit of a mouthful, but the principle is simple. The people elect a mostly absolute ruler who will rule for five years. They can be granted two additional years in a re-election if they are popular enough. When their term, extended or not, ends, they are beheaded in public after a new leader has been chosen. There are clauses that can give exceptions in dire cases (defensive war or some other disaster), but they are rarely invoked.

The principle of this is that only those who wish to better their nation and are prepared to pay the ultimate price to do it will put themselves forward as a candidate to rule. It is by no means a perfect system, but I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. So, what about all of you? Did you have any unique governments in your settings? Tell us about it :)

I will be DMing a DnD 5e adventure going from levels 1-12 starting this week. I am finishing up the personal quests for each character to help tie them in more into the adventure and give them something to look forward to for themselves. Most of the characters were pretty easy to work with, but I am somewhat stuck on the Armorer Artificer.

They have stated that their character's dream is to create a legendary item. Whether it be an artefact or just some other powerful magic item, doesn't matter too much to them. Handing out a powerful magic item as the final reward for a personal quest is very classical anyways, so I'd love to go with it.

The problem is, I can't think of anything fun to give an Armorer Artificer. They have lots of stuff to work with on their own, so neither a weapon nor an armor is really going to be of interest to them.

Have any of you homebrewed some fun items just for Armorer Artificers or have any idea for existing (be it Wizards stuff or homebrew) stuff to hand out? It should be a considerable reward for someone around level 10.

You know that situation. You have a player or players doing something awesome. You give them an inspiration. And they say : I already have one.

It sucks because the system is made that you can only have one at a time. Sure it encourages them to use them, but not always. And if a player is awesome twice without a big die roll he just won't have the time to use it.

One time I was fed up and made this item on the fly : the bottled inspiration.

Its an item that you gain when you get an inspiration and already have one. Its weightless. It takes an action to "drink" it and regain an inspiration, so you cannot do it back to back. And there is no limit to how many you can carry. One of my players made it to 8 one time.

I never had the displeasure of not being able to recompense a player and its been over 2 years using them without drawbacks.

I highly suggest to think of this next time you hear that sad response of already having one.

Lately I've been using solo play tools more and more in my prep. For example instead of just pulling a town out of my imagination or from a bunch of tools. I've (mainly) used Ironsworn to solo play some episodes in that town. Creating details about it as I've gone along. Also used Artefact (more of a journaling game) with good effect to create legendary items. To get into the Glorantha setting, get into the "right" mindset, the solo choose-you-own-adventure I've found great.

But I'm always looking for new tools to, if nothing else, get new perspectives on things. My default Ironsworn is leaning kinda heavily into more perilous and grim episodes.

Happy for any and all recommendations!

SuperGeek Mike knocks it out of the park with this video, featuring a really useful set of tips!

I was thinking of an idea of having one of the PCs experience by visions of dark future - sudden attack, party dead, all their beloved npcs killed, their home base destroyed. Visions would be sent by BBEG to tell that PC "if you won't join me, this is what will happen".

I was considering few options how to implement this in session, weighting ups and downs of each and thought to ask your opinion which is best

• A vision is simply narrated to the party or that player in a solo session

• Run a game where suddenly party is attacked by an overwhelming force and killed in combat, with that PC being last one standing, then reveal its just a vision they experienced and everyone is fine

• As above but in secret talk with that pc's player beforehand and tell them this is going to happen and is not the first vision they had like this, but 2nd or 3rd

• Warn the party in advance either there will be a fake tpk or some "dream/vision shenanigans"

• Tell all players except the one whose pc will experience the vision and ask them to be my "co-conspirators" and help "sell" this moment by playing along.

So, this started with a notification I got on Kickstarter about The Secret Art of Gamemastery . Is this worth picking up? Do you have any better suggestions for DMing advice?

Hi there, fellow DMs!

I'm a fairly new DM (as in: I have around 20 sessions behind my back), and while my players seem to be enjoying the campaign, I've run into a bit of a problem.

Namely, that the three godsdamned paladins are trivializing most combat encounters.

They just leveled up to level 8, but even at level 7:

• Attack rolls against them? LOL, CR 7-9 enemies usually have +6-+8 to hit at most; they will miss the paladins (and the cleric) in plate armor + shield 60-75% of the time.
• Saving throw abilities and spells? Fuck me, aura of protection, everybody gets +2 or more to all their saves.
• Even if a spell slips through? Ancients paladin. Whoever came up with the Aura of Warding at WotC deserves a kick in the head. Everybody near the paladin takes half damage from every spell (quarter if they make the save) because balancing encounters is soooooooooooooo easy!

And that is just their passive abilities. There's of course the usual issue of smites (the three of them can easily deal 24d8 damage in one turn, that's 108 on average - and that's without accounting for crits or them stacking a smite spell on it too). Ranged enemies? LOL, orbital laser goes BZOT! (Moonbeam) Or they'll just leave them to the ranger, cleric, and the warlock. And if they still get banged up, they have 105 HP of dedicated healing between them (plus the cleric and the ranger).

Is there any way to make combat encounters challenging for this party besides trying to overwhelm them through action economy (it's a party of 6, so that would take a shitton of monsters and turn the combat into a slog), finding a way to force them into 6-8 encounters between long rests (wouldn't do anything about the passive abilities but it would at least curtail the smite-nukes), or turning the game into Dark Souls with every monster being a horrible damage sponge that can one-shot any player on a hit?

Because at this point I'm afraid that anything shy of a tarrasque would be a minor inconvenience at best instead of a challenge or a boss.

Hello everyone!

The BBEG of our ongoing campaign is not carved in stone yet, so I'm looking for some inspiration. As far as I've encountered them, the overwhelming majority of evil masterminds in pop culture and fiction are male. I'd like to have anything different than that, but at the moment, I can't think of many examples to draw inspiration from.

I don't have a lot of specifications for what I'm looking for. Apart from not being male, they should just be examples of true spite, not someone who can be bargained with. And they shouldn't be the right hand of another greater villain, but stand on their own feet in terms of scheming and orchestrating bad stuff. (So no Darth Vader, but an Emperor. An Empress, actually, or really anything but a dude.) They can come from any genre, media and setting. Favorable if they can pack a punch or two or more, though not mandatory.

D&D has Tiamat and Lolth, Star Trek TNG has the Borg Queen. But other than that, my mind's completely blank right now. I'd really appreciate any suggestions for more baddies to take a look at, characters that help me to get into other evil mindsets than those I'm most familiar with.

Thank you very much!

So, I have this world that was perfectly at peace, until the party came around. Now, It's basically MWW (magical world war). And my players are looking foward to some trench warfare in dnd.

Why trench warfare? Because mold earth is a cantrip and it is always better to have cover. I have a couple of basic ideas.

The bullet points are:

Scrolls, rare magic items and more than lv5 npcs are hard to come by, because they are strategical game changers froom both sides.

There is gunpowder in the world and the spell detect traps actually detects traps (location of all in an area), so, landmines are a thing.

Someone as figured out ballista machine guns, so charging is unadvised.

I'm looking for tactics and general suggestions.

Hello all,

I have been running a level 20 epic campaign where the party is trying to defeat a lich who has ruled over a land full of monsters for hundreds of years blah blah blah etc etc. Anyways to make things fun as they have been hunting for the lich's phylactery I also chose to send the Grim Reaper after them since we are using Pathfinder 2e and he has a stat block in that game.

So they eventually discovered a Sphere of Annihilation that I put in the game cause it seemed like fun and the players got an idea. They got a wonderful, terrible idea.

The Grim Reaper followed them to this sphere, then they ambushed him and managed to shift the Sphere over to him and annihilated him utterly. Unfortunately they also destroyed themselves in the process. It is a party of seven and four of them were fully annihilated, two are out of range and have survived, and one has attempted to use dimensional anchor on themselves and is hoping that in my benevolence I will allow him to survive. He is also the one who killed everyone by moving the Sphere in the first place.

Does anybody have any ideas on what to do now? While we are all fine with the party dying, I would like to reward them for this incredibly creative solution not punish them. We are also so close to facing the lich himself as they had just managed to destroy the phylactery, so I would like to finish the game. Should I have some god save them but at a cost? Maybe the one is tethered finds some way to pull the party out of the Sphere while the players in the Sphere fight the Grim Reaper on the edge of the Abyss or something? Happy to hear suggestions for fun ideas. Anything goes cause they are level 20 and we are a wacky bunch already.

TL;DR Cult of Dragon / Wizards of Thay have captured my level 19 party. Meant to have cult leader be the mastermind (which would have made plenty of sense) but "accidentally" had the leader of all of Thay be there instead. Looking for good story-hook to have him involved to keep from having to retcon half a session (and possible compelling storyline)

First off...... I sincerely and genuinely apologize for being wordy in the following....

Background for context: My 5 players are all level 19 (leveling to 20 next time the can take a break). They've gone through all of the official Rise of Tiamat material and have finished several months of homebrew stuff to get them from lvl 15 to 20, culminating with them gathering spell components for Blackstaff to protect Waterdeep. Some months back, the wizard had gotten disintegrated by the cult and the cult of the dragon had recovered his gear, notably including a Staff of Power, +2 Ring of Protection, Ring of Spell Storing, a bag of holding, Ring of Spell Turning, and an Archivist's key. In the months since that had happened, he had found replacements or substitutions for most of it and more than one legendary item that would more than make up for it, but his character (very good RPer) really wanted to recover the archivist's key for RP reasons.... so he used Wish to get a simulacrum and the sim's Wish to pull out a veeeery carefully worded and well thought out 120-word spell to recover all his lost gear without any ramifications that he would consider negative. The player had obviously put a lot of thought into the wording, and he pulled this out in the middle of our session, and while very quick on my feat, I couldn't immediately figure out how to do something unpredictable without holding up the session while I put thought into it, so I basically teleported all his stuff to him like he asked, along with all the cp, sp, gp, & pp that was in a pile with it, having been hoarded for Tiamat's return (the player was aware of it's location and surrounding already). It goes without saying that the party was aware they were immediately being scryed on, and they immediately went on a several-hundred-thousand-gp shopping spree, not having considered that, perhaps, the cult would want their ill-gotten gains back (and the dragons that had donated substantial portions of their hoard).

Fast forward an in-game week and they had just completed a difficult quest and were teleport-circling back to their tavern (modified Trollskull in Waterdeep) when they found themselves, instead, in a 10' wide cell and a Rube Goldberg machine then exposed something akin to an artificially created beholder's eye to nullify magic in the entire cell. My intent was to have Severin Silrajin be the one to have orchestrated this (after all, capture, neutralize, and keep alive is safer than killing just to be resurrected somewhere else and come back) with the help of the Thayan wizards allied with the cult.... however it was late at night and I was tired when putting tokens on the board and my tired brain put Szass Tam there, instead, having cooked up a character sheet appropriate for him and everything.

It was only during the session, when he introduced himself and the appropriate amount of "oh crap" came from the wizard, I realized that.... lore wise, there's no official "he's doing this" during the time period for the Tyranny of Dragons (Hoard of the Dragon Queen + Rise of Tiamat) campaign time frame. And not only that, it's specifically mentioned that it's a "splinter sect" of the Thayan wizards that joined the cult. I spun it into a "You have been a thorn in the side of some of my brethren for quite some time. They approached me and we came to an accommodation, so I have captured and neutralized you and as long as you don't do something stupid, I won't kill you" kind of deal. My original intent was for the party to realize the Ranger/Druid could still wildshape and free the party, they could fight a hand full of undead and possibly discover a secret or two while leaving the tower (can't teleport while inside the tower), and once outside, they find that somehow the cult/wizards had teleported their entire tavern and looted it for anything worth value (and had done something the Wizard would count as a "too high" price).

My question is this: I really don't want to have to ret-con something like this if I can help it... Can anyone think of any way of spinning this outside of either A) Szass will release them if they do a job for him or B) Szass is really on the side of the cult?

My off-the-cuff thoughts are that if the official module has the players standing a decent chance (though not guaranteed) of defeating Tiamat at level 15... and my hella-beefed-up CR 30 Mythic Tiamat should be defeatable by the level 20 extremely well equipped party (with some npc help at times).... then demigod status or not, Szass believes that Tiamat is defeatable and he may plan to steal the cult's gold to fund Thay for a few centuries or something.... idk, I'm spit balling, but would love to hear what anyone else thinks!

(Also, here's my hand-crafted Thayan Tower map (with Forgotten Adventures assets) if anyone wants it. Go wild. Will include the DungeonDraft file as well for anyone who wants to edit.)

You know that place in Dragonball, the time temple near God that gives a fighter 1 year of training for one day outside ?

I kinda did this for my players.

I gave them permission for the full week to interact through roleplaying on the Discord channel of roleplaying as if it was happening instantly.

Why ?

Because we were at a very very very important crossroad for everyone and there wasn't a single second to discuss it at the start of the next session, which was starting with a battle that included 4 dragons, one of which was an ancient red.

And... well, it's both important and just fun to discuss in character of what to do when shit hit the fan, especially when you see a few ways the whole campaign could go to and you don't know for sure which is the actual good one for everyone.

It worked... sorta. Not everyone was on the same side, 2 of them prefered to leave the group and 2 joined with the bad guy that was their boss at the moment. And since the direction the campaign took then didn't really satisfied anyone, in the end I retconned before the very first big "oh no" happened.

But yeah, that metagaming bubble is a tool I'm glad that I have used, even if the result wasn't perfect. Highly recommand it, if you want to give your players a small hiatus of talking between sessions.

There was a link to a somewhat old blog post about 10 wizard illnesses/diseases that I saved and then lost the link. Does anyone have it? They were really creative and the writer had published a bunch of stuff on Drive Thru RPG. Might have been D&D or OSR.

One of them involved a contagious disease that eats your spell slots one by one and when you lose all of them you transform into a froglike creature that only says one word?

Hello there fellow ex-DM academy scholars, Just left Reddit for good, so I'm here with a question that wasn't answered in under spez's shadow, so I might try it here if I can.

I would like to know if you know of magical items or spells for 5th or similar that would attract ghosts and other spirits : ghosts, banshees, souls, etc.

I would like to take example from an existing item for what I am preparing in a currently used dungeon that I made.

Thank you in advance, and fuck spez

I am planning a campaign where the PCs will get stranded with some NPCs with the goal of making the survival aspect a major part of the early levels and building up and protecting the Village the motivation for adventuring.

Are there any resources for this style of game i should be aware of so, trying to make a system for building and managing a small comunity, I don't reinvent the wheel?

EDIT: Thank you so much <3 There are many good Ideas and directions to take Inspiration from.

Hello All!

First time using the new platform - F*ck Spez

I am building an utterly MASSIVE dungeon that is based on the idea of a hidden library. Its ancient, full of lost secrets and treasure. It shifts and moves and its easy to get lost.

I'm trying to populate sections with relevant loot for my party. I have RNG tables, but I prefer not to use them, as I like having narrative reasons for why something is there. (For instance, you find a dead adventurer, and in their pack is healing potions and a magic item).

There is a section of the library that is completely underwater. Its for housing the literature of underwater civilizations - "books" that would dry out and be lost if they ever left the water.

What sort of magic items would be found in this section? Bonus points if its book-themed. (I've already got the obvious ones that give you water breathing or swim speed, help me be more creative)

THANKS!

Any tips for adapting published adventures to a different language?

In my case, to Spanish but I'm looking for general tips, for example I'm gonna run Wild beyond the witch light soon and I'm having to sit down and think of what name would make sense I'm the setting while also being easy to remember and to pronounce to my players.

For example:

Tither Nither are hard, specially because of the TH, I'm thinking on translating them to "Aquí y Allá" I think they kind of work and seem easy to make rimes with.

Now I'm adapting/translating all the NPC's names and tip is welcome.

So I'm gearing up to once again start something and I've got an idea in my head. But once I put it down into something concise it either becomes bloaty or dry. I mean just the parts below are almost a google docs page, pretty much 2000 characters. And that is even when I removed 2/3 of the situation text as it was rather big picture information. Explicitly writing down the campaign style was something I took Colville's recent game design video, trying it out.

What I really would love feedback on is mainly Situation. Enough/too little information? Is it confusing? Does the information fit with the Campaign Style? And also is Campaign Style something fitting in a campaign ad/synopsis?

Situation

You all are part of the third imperially sponsored caravan into the Aablu, the hot and arid lands east of the Pearl Cities. The first caravan went out eight months ago and was expected to have returned two months ago. Second left four months ago with another destination. Yours have the same destination as the first with the additional task of bringing back news of the first.

Information about Aablu is scarce and unreliable, mostly because traders and inhabitants in the Pearl Cities don’t venture into it and its local people consider themselves under no obligation to divulge information. There are of course tidbits of information: old travellers’ journals, hearsay and sales-talk. You are not headed blind into the Aablu, only mostly.

The caravan itself is the size of a small village, with competent people of various professions who are there for their own reasons. Some want to strike it rich, some are running from something, some are there for the glory and some just want a bit of adventure. Your characters are also competent individuals, filling a role in the caravan and have ambition to make something extra of themselves.

Campaign style

Adventurous daring sword and sorcery.

Adventurous - The very nature of the caravan is an adventure and on it are those with an adventurous spirit. When it calls, your characters are those who step up, those who have a bit extra drive to see what is on the other side of the hill.

Daring - Rewarded are those who boldly go where no one has gone before. Daring plans are to be rewarded and there is always a chance to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

Sword and Sorcery (from Wikipedia) - A subgenre of fantasy characterized by sword-wielding heroes engaged in exciting and violent adventures. Elements of romance, magic, and the supernatural are also often present. Unlike works of high fantasy, the tales, though dramatic, focus on personal battles rather than world-endangering matters.