Virtual Tabletops are More Than Maps
March 27, 2008
Virtual tabletops—my own EpicTable included—tend to put the spotlight on maps. Most (probably all) virtual tabletops provide a lot more than maps. There’s chat, character sheets, rules automation, and various kinds of media that a GM can send to the players…but still, a lot of the focus is on maps.
I’ve said to myself all along that there are other aspects of the gaming experience that are important—especially to the more story-oriented crowd, and I’ve imagined EpicTable following the roleplay vector more than the wargame vector over the next several years. Don’t get me wrong—I think maps are important, and I’m a long-time D&D player, so I’m not throwing away my battlemat anytime soon…but I had an interesting couple of experiences this week that put virtual tabletops into a little bit different perspective for me. Read more
RPG Map Tiles
March 8, 2008
Awhile back, I wrote a post about finding maps for your virtual tabletop . This post is more general. I’ll be talking about map tiles–not full maps. I’ll cover tiles for your face-to-face game as well as for your virtual tabletop.
The Dire Tombs cover there on your left wasn’t chosen randomly. This post started out as my just wanting to rave about how much I like Wizards of the Coast’s Dungeon Tiles. I’m still going to do that, but it struck me that there are many, many options when it comes to map tiles. So, I had a look around and thought I’d share some observations. Read more
Monsters for Sale: Buying D&D Mini Singles
February 25, 2008
Continuing on the game prep theme from last time, I thought I’d talk a bit about buying D&D miniatures. Alright, before you skip this post: This isn’t about the D&D Miniatures game, nor is it about D&D. It’s about getting those unpainted metal miniatures, those stray dice, stones and random bits of plastic off your battlemat and replacing them with something more representative. Read more
Sound of a Desert Nightmare
February 17, 2008
Awhile back, I talked about artwork that inspires me as a GM. My game is currently in a three week hiatus while I plot the campaign’s next chapter, which includes a trip to a not-very-nice desert location.
My plotting was thrown into high gear this weekend when I just stumbled upon the album, “Necronomicon”, from a band called Nox Arcana. Read more
Microsoft Built My GameMaster Notebook
February 13, 2008
When it comes to RPG session prep, there’s a fairly strong inclination among GMs towards free products. Any why not? There are some decent wikis out there, there are some products aimed specifically at RPG campaign management. So, why have I dropped my Wiki-On-a-Stick in favor of Microsoft’s OneNote 2007? Read more
Living Legends
February 6, 2008
Legends aren’t just for long-dead heroes and villans. You can make your world more real to the players and take some of the sting out of a character death by incorporating legends about the characters’ deeds into your current campaign. Read more
Virtual Tabletops and In-Character/Out-of-Character Speech
February 1, 2008
This post presents some ideas for separating player speech from character speech when playing roleplaying games on a virtual tabletop.
Around your kitchen table, it’s probably obvious when you’re talking vs. when your character is talking. Especially if you’re that guy who always plays a gnome or a halfling and has to stay in character all the time. (You know who you are. Stop it.) When your group moves to a virtual tabletop, though, you need a new way to keep track of who’s saying what. Read more
Arrivals and Departures: Tracking Moving Monsters
January 29, 2008
The last couple posts discussed a technique I call a “Flight Plan” to plan for your monsters’ retreat. The idea is to figure out ahead of time where your monsters will get going when the going gets tough. That way, you don’t have them blundering about in unbelievable ways.
But planning for fleeing monsters is just the start of your trouble. Once they’ve fled, you have to keep track of them. This post presents a technique for keeping track of the shifting encounter setting that arises when monsters move about in response to the player characters. Read more
Recipe for Retreat
January 25, 2008
The last article suggested a way to record your plans for adversaries that flee an encounter. In this article, I offer some advice on formulating those plans.
Planning for Defeat
January 23, 2008
Your heroes have scattered the villanous kobolds that ambushed them. Great. But where will they go? This article presents a technique for planning the monsters’ escape.
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