X Rounds of Combat

Day 22 - LOST The opportunities of getting lost and learning from LOST (the TV show). In 5th edition a successful Wisdom / Survival check means that you cannot get lost and will always arrive to your destination. However party getting lost gives DM an opportunity to roll on those sweet sweet random encounter tables, and then anything can happen, and both the Players and DM can have more fun with something unpredictable happening. OK, my turn to stab you. DM advice from other media. LOST was a TV phenomenon for a while, did some controversial stuff, but also did some good things. What are THOSE?! The Good - dropping some plot-lines that lead nowhere and nobody cares about is fine The Bad - dropping plot-lines because you kind of forgot about them is not good, having no main antagonist or goal is just problematic The Ugly - a sort of mundane explanation for mysterious coincidences should be avoided - polar bear showing up when someone is reading a comic book where a...

DAY 21 - VAST The original, old school way of playing D&D promises a vast, almost infinite world with infinite possibilities. The land that was promised But this is what you as a player might get. A lot of imagination required For many players, not always new ones, that is too much of a choice. "You can go anywhere, you can do anything". But where to go? What to do? Even with maps that present something it is usually abstracted to a degree that is difficult. Looks good to me when I analyse it a bit, but what does it tell you? This is mostly just colours ChicagoWiz's advice on both his blog and in his unfortunately defunct podcast The Dungeon Master's Handbook  was to create just three hexes . Start small, don't smother your players with choices, develop as you go depending on the events of the game, player expectations and your own ideas. The world does not need to be overly vast to feel alive.

Day 20 - NOBLE There are generally two types of being noble - being born into a aristocratic class, and acting honourably.  The "being born into it" reminds me of an old D&D setting Birthright   where you play rules given powers by gods. It has some focus on domain level play and sounds interesting. There even was a video game based off it.    Wow, such realism. Wow, much D&D Hey, you don't look the same in the game Of course all nobles are white, anything else would be unrealistic. Elves, dragons, magic? This is fine. The other nobility is having high morals and ideals, like Sturm Brightblade , a character from Dragonlance Chronicles, who embodied the ideals of the Knights of Solamnia despite not being one of them. Yeah, that guy with a moustache. Also, if you're located in North America there's an online store - Noble Knight Games - that has decent prices and a metric ton of stuff on sale. You can get s...

Day 19 - SCARY The whole process started around Ann Rice and her vampires being seductive and closer to succubi. Then came the brooding sparkling vegetarians in Twilight. But fear not! (or rather do) because there are still vampires that resemble more their monstrous originals. In recent media there are: Netflix’s Castlevania  based off a series of video games – gothic monsters and magic. It's a really good show Guillermo del Toro's The Strain  where vampires are more of a disease, but monstrous nonetheless. That thing is disgusting and freaky AF. For your gaming needs there's Ravenloft an absolute DnD classic from 1st, 2nd and 5th edition, with legendary Strahd von Z as the master BBEG. Strahd von Z And a recently released campaign module Undying Orbs Omnibus for Swords and Wizardry, compatible with other retro-clones and easily converted to DnD 5e. Not the most informative cover

Day 18 - PLENTY Post-scarcity economy describes a hypothetical form of economy or society, often explored in science fiction, in which things such as goods, services and information are free, or practically free. Think Star Trek and it's Starfleet. Starfleet officers don't earn money because they have replicators for food and everything else is freely available to them. For all we know this might be the case with the rest of the Federation, but it has not been explored in the shows. We only have what Captain Picard has said in First Contact : The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force of our lives.   We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity. Star Trek Adventures from Modiphius In that case, playing Star Trek Adventures , what is your motivation? As a player you are here to have fun. What is the motivation of your character to do what they do? There is no gold or wealth to accrue, no monsters to kill. Here are my ideas: Curiosity - I...

Day 17 - ONE One game to rule them all… The game that I'm really interested in playing is… The One Ring  Everything's fine. We've got this Set between The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, from Cubicle 7 . They have also created a 5e adaptation of it called Adventures in Middle-earth. The only MMORPG I played for longer and enjoyed it was The Lord of the Rings Online . There.

I'm falling behind by a day. I'll try to catch up. Day 16 - DREAM I have two favourite ways to utilise dreams in RPGs. I see you're busy fighting the monster. I'll call you back. Information Information dreams can be interactive or non-interactive. The non-interactive are just a “cinematic” that is meant to provide player(s) either with some backstory, show them something that is happening somewhere else and technically their characters wouldn’t normally know, or can be a foreshadowing of future events.  The interactive aim and use is similar. The character is provided with information they would not have access otherwise but this time they interact with someone (a deity, spirit, ancestor, djinn). In this case they get to ask some questions that they might even get some truthful answers. I love maps Traversal Faerie roads from Jonathan Strange and Mr Norell function as a parallel plane of existence through which one can travel between ph...