#rpgaday #rpgaday2019 - RPG a Day - "Suspense"

-

Day 27 - SUSPENSE

The simplest way of introducing some suspense into your game is foreshadowing.

Everything is better with Tim Curry

Foreshadowing is a writing technique where you introduce a "gun hanging on the wall" that will soon fire. You can introduce a plot point that will quite obviously develop into something that the players anticipate, they just don't know how and when it happens.

Rocky Horror Picture Show is the best musical, fight me!

The Pirate story in the Watchmen foreshadows the events of the main comic book.
In Empire Strikes Back after Luke kills the phantom Vader he sees his own face.
Boromir from his very introduction wants to use the One Ring.
When you watch the Sixth Sense again you realise that there is not a single interaction between the main character and the living people.

Telegraph things to your players, get them to speculate or even guess the development of events just don't tell them when the hammer falls.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Silvery Moon Tavern - review

-
Image
Product received for free So... You meet in a tavern... This supplement from Silver Bulette   gives the DM a fully fleshed out tavern, easy to insert in any fantasy city but also a part of their  Undying Orbs Omnibus   campaign (review soon-ish to follow). The basic idea is to have a sort of headquarters, a place where the party will be coming back on a regular basis to replenish the resources and rest between the adventures. What's in the box?! The many sections of the Silvery Moon Tavern supplement give an overview of the history of the tavern hinting at some events in the outside world. There is a dozen of tavern employees described, with portraits and plot hooks involving them either by referring to their personal lives or by tying them to some events in the area. There are five adventuring parties frequenting the place - from very low level to a serious threat - that can be utilised as a friendly competition or straight up enemies. A random table to creat
Read more

#rpgaday #rpgaday2019 - RPG a Day - "Examine"

-
Image
Day 11 - Examine In early editions of Dungeons & Dragons , and therefore in most of the retro-clones like Swords & Wizardry , there was a concept of Player Skill. Your characters didn't have skills, proficiencies and whatnot. It was up to you, the player to come up with ideas and provide some descriptions.  To examine the room you did not roll for your room searching skill.  Ready to examine the environs How do you want to do this? You would then describe how you're checking all the chests, all the drawers, looking for secret compartments and such. In long hallways and corridors of a dungeon you would search for traps by checking if all the stones are the same level, if some stepping plates seem to be covered in dust as if no one walks on them, and then you would poke them anyway with a ten foot pole. Ten foot pole - an adventurer's necessity since the first D&D module B1 - In Search of the Unknown Your descriptions of examining obje
Read more

RuneQuest: Roleplaying in Glorantha quick start - review

-
Image
Skip this intro Growing up in Poland everyone was either playing Warhammer or some homebrew. Or most likely a  WFRP's Old World  run on mechanics homebrewed beyond any recognition. The only info about Glorantha and RuneQuest  we had back then was that it's that weird system with ducks. It was sort of hinted in Magia i Miecz  ("Magic & Sword") the only serious magazine we had that the classic RuneQuest was one of the founding systems of the hobby in the before times . In the edgy 90s that was not "dark" or "mature" or "realistic" enough. But now that I'm reading of how Glorantha works, it turns out that it is what I was always looking for in an RPG setting.  I watched the game on YouTube being run by Jeff Richards mostly because I follow the WebDM team. (they were using pre-gens from the quick start but a different adventure) Quick start The quick start booklet has been released for Free RPG Day 2017  as a previ
Read more