A Never Ending Parade of Characters and NPCs on NeverEnding
By guest poster Jamie Van Doren, Founder/CEO of NeverEnding, Inc
Dungeon Masters and players tend to have hundreds of character ideas living rent free in their head. And that’s just where they’ll stay unless you’re an artist or can afford thousands of dollars in character commissions. At least that’s how it used to be. NeverEnding is a brand new TTRPG company developing an entire digital tool box for DMs, players, streamers and storytellers of all kinds.
Wilderness Adventurer Couture
Going on an adventure in the wilderness? Here are different categories of heroes for wilderness adventures for fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons. Whatever the case may be for you it is best to make sure you are prepared to become one with nature in the fashion sense. Asking around and doing your research is the perfect start!
Incorporating Traps Effectively in 5E D&D
Salutations, nerds! Today I’m writing about traps and how they work in fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons. This is one of those things I don’t see in 5E D&D play as often as I used to and honestly it’s a bit of a shame. In this post I’m thinking about ways of incorporating traps into dungeons and instead of throwing a bunch of traps out for Dungeon Masters to use I’m going to break down what goes into a good one and how to make them satisfying for players. Ready? Let’s do this.
Make RPG Experiences Come Alive Through Finely Crafted Boxed Text
My personal Game Master style has been described to me as descriptive and evocative and this greatly pleases me. Whenever I play a tabletop roleplaying game the juice for me is imagining what it is like for a character existing in whatever settings and surroundings the game entails. So when I’m behind the GM screen it’s important to me to elicit the same immersive experience for the other players. Conjuring vivid imagery of people, places and things helps players put themselves in their characters’ perspectives and brings the world and the game itself to more vibrant life. The folks behind dScryb feel the same way and they’ve put together a terrific resource to help GMs free up their time and create a sensory experience to help set the narrative tone, introduce scenes and spotlight what is important in your worlds of epic fantasy.
Skillfully Designing New Skills for 5E D&D
Fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons has taken the world by storm and I contend this is a big factor in the surge of popularity enjoyed by all tabletop roleplaying games of late. As the list of TTRPG options expands seemingly by the day new games offer their own spins on various mechanics and sometimes this leads people to find a new TTRPG option they like even better than the D&D that once held their hearts and minds. In an effort to bring new life to the world’s greatest roleplaying game I’ve devised a series of new homebrew options meant to streamline gameplay and offer some crunch to previously nebulous ideas. In this post I’m adding some crunch to 5E D&D skills.
Discovering RPG Conflict in Unexpected Places
Salutations, nerds! I’ve written about tabletop roleplaying games and what it means to be a Game Master in terms of scenes and what goes into making one. I’d like to touch on a brief recap regarding conflict in RPGs. The only metric that matters in terms of what makes a great RPG scene is if everyone involved in it enjoyed themselves. Some players are perfectly content to roleplay shopping scenes with no conflict. They’ll enjoy the conversations when the time to do so affords. These players are blessings and should not be taken for granted because they make a GM’s job easy. But there are those who won’t be satisfied with these circumstances and don’t mistake me — this doesn’t make them bad players! Conflict is the life blood of the RPG experience. Often the difference between a good story and a boring one is the good story understands a scene really begins when there is a conflict and ends when this conflict is resolved.
Is Your TTRPG a Film or a Series?
At the same time all of us tabletop roleplaying game nerds enjoy the renaissance of gaming we’re currently in there’s an equally exciting renewal in the entertainment world when it comes to storytelling. Ongoing and limited series on TV and the growing number of streaming services give audiences — and creators — opportunities to develop rich worlds and deeply complex characters. The best recent example is WandaVision, the Disney+ miniseries continuing the story of Wanda Maximoff and Vision established in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This incredible series crystalized some ideas I’ve been exploring about how and when character development during a TTRPG campaign. So let’s get into it.
Streamline Your 5E D&D Game with Alternate Saving Throws
Many staple mechanics of fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons shape the greater genre of tabletop roleplaying game options. While 5E D&D is my favorite edition I have found myself wondering recently if perhaps this game couldn’t be even better. Is there a way to hack 5E D&D to make it more streamlined? Being the plucky adventurer I fancy myself to be I’m determined to try. In the previous post I wrote about an alternate ability scores and an option to streamline things regarding those. Today I’m taking the next logical option to explore with saving throws. For those of you who don’t know I have a YouTube channel and as part of #DungeonMarch I’m posting exclusively RPG content all month long.
How to Evoke Fear in a TTRPG Character
Salutations, nerds! Today I’m writing about striking fear in the hearts of tabletop roleplaying game players. And no I don’t mean just in the sense of a player making an obscenely high attack roll and telling them they miss. I mean truly unsettling the players. This may just be a me thing but nothing turns me off of an adventure faster than someone telling me my character feels terrified. This is acutely true in a situation where my character wouldn’t even be unsettled. Some TTRPG characters may be really freaked out walking into a room strewn with viscera for example but a character with a history of murdering people and using their internal organs as a sacrifice to a dark deity probably isn’t going to be too bothered by these circumstances. And honestly forcing a character into having a fear response to a scenario that wouldn’t scare them is cheating.
TTRPG Stock Sessions — Nightmare and Phobia
Salutations, nerds! At the time of writing this post I am getting ready to run a session going along with the subject matter. Hopefully by now the players involved have already done it and there won’t be any chance of spoilers. Today I’m focusing on character phobias in tabletop roleplaying games and the nightmare stock sessions where they’re brought manifest for the characters to deal with during the TTRPG experience.
Identifying and Handling Emotional Bleed at the Game Table
Salutations, nerds! Today we’re going to talk about emotional bleed. In the context of tabletop roleplaying games by this I mean when a character’s emotions get pretty intense and the player starts feeling them too. The first thing I want you to know is this isn’t a bad thing! You shouldn’t feel bad when this happens. It is perfectly normal and most roleplayers have a tale or two about this happening to them.
All About Bags!
One of the most essential pieces of equipment you just have to have for adventuring gear is a bag! Where, oh where are you going to put things if you do not have the bag space? Do you have special treasures or items you need to conceal and keep close? What type of bag do you have it in? There are so many different types so let’s dive right in.
New Possibilities Abound with 5E D&D Alternate Ability Scores
Fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons has taken the world by storm and it makes a lot of sense. The creation of the Open Game License (lovingly referred to as the OGL) opened the floodgates for creators to use a core set of rules for developing everything from supplementary materials for the tabletop to video games. This popularized many core aspects of the system and created genre staples and today I want to challenge one of those 5E D&D staples and offer my own take.
Adding the Eldritch Foundry to your D&D Game
I wanted to create a cool location to add to your Dungeons & Dragons game and the fine people over at Eldritch Foundry asked us to share how awesome their minis are so here is a great way to do both. Eldritch Foundry makes great miniatures. I first met them at Gen Con and they were already fans of Nerdarchy. Eldritch Foundry is a web based program allowing you to design and print 3D miniatures for your tabletop roleplaying games. There are loads of ever expanding options for use in creating fantastic miniatures of your own design.
TTRPG Stock Sessions — The Time Loop
Salutations, nerds! Today I’m going focusing in on Groundhog Day. Not the movie but the concept of being stuck in a time loop as a tabletop roleplaying game stock session. This episode comes up in a lot of places. The first one coming to mind right now being the Supernatural episode where the brothers Winchester die repeatedly and have to live the day over. The time loop TTRPG stock session comes with a warning label — It’s frustrating to deal with. The time loop is a concept you want to make sure players are okay with before bringing it to the table. All the advice you see about how parties need clear goals is really hard to pull off in a situation like this so proceed with caution. After you’ve cleared it with your TTRPG group here are the things you have to hammer out.
