Friday Five: 2010-07-23
July 23rd, 2010A Deeper Understanding of GM Notes
Notes. Notes. Notes. We all take notes during the game. OK. Maybe not all of us, but every good GM should take notes, and I highly recommend that at least one player take notes. With two people taking notes, you’ll get the players’ perspectives in the game as well as the GM’s outlook. Plus there are some things that only the GM knows about the NPCs, world, monsters, treasure, etc. It’s just the natural way of things. DNAPhil has a great write-up on GM notes and how they are used. I highly recommend you go check them out.
More Confessions of a D&D Camp Councilor
I linked to the first post about D&D Camp last week, so I felt obliged to link to the follow-up post. It’s a great read and really gives me hope for the future of my favorite hobby.
Grow The Hobby With Great Game Mastering
Speaking of the future of hobbies, here’s a post from Johnn about running great games that will keep your players coming back, including the newbies!
Unique scrolls in fantasy RPGs
I love unique magic items. In the RPG that I’ve worked on for a while (and hope to get back to this December when a non-compete contract expires) there is no such thing as a “long sword +1″ or any other “+1″ item for that matter. Sure, some items may grant a +1 bonus to attack and/or damage, but there’s so much more to a magical item in my RPG than just that one thing. Every item has a name. Every item has a history. Every item has a future. Most items have a personality as well. It’s just in the nature of magic in the RPG that this has to be the case… plus I was tired of people buying up +1 items like they were candy.
NewbieDM Review: Pathfinder Gamemastery Guide
This is a great review from NewbieDM about the Pathfinder Gamemastery Guide. I don’t have a copy of it yet due to some budgetary constraints, but I hope to pick it up soon. There are quite a few Pathfinder titles that are on my “get it soon” list, and this is one of them. NewbieDM’s review just bumped up the book a few notches to place it at or near the top of the wish list. I can’t wait to get my hands on the book. One thing that made me sad about his post is that he states that he doesn’t like Pathfinder as a system. I just feel he’s missing out on some great role playing with the system. However, to each his own. I’m sure there are a few systems out there that he loves that I can’t stand.
