Stew reader LesInk threw an interesting morsel into the suggestion pot the other day. It is about the concept of railroading and how you force an event to happen when the plot absolutely calls for it. The concept is an interesting one, and LesInk put forth a great solution along with the question and story.   Dear Gnomies, ...

Welcome to the second digest of Gnome Stew's bite-sized game mastering tips, all of which were originally posted on Twitter (@gnomestew) from July 14, 2009 through February 7, 2010. (Punctuality: not always our strong suit...) We archive our GMing tweets in this article series, making them searchable and collecting them for readers who don't use Twitter. Bite-sized tips can be a great source of inspiration, and can help keep ...

Aside from a lack of fear, one of the biggest problems in having player characters act realistically in a combat situation is the use of hit points (or a similar mechanic). The player knows how much damage her PC can soak before falling and can make tactical decisions based on the amount of damage that a creature/armed villain/martial artist/trap doles out. Ultimately, this is a matter of security. Players ...

Over the last couple of years, I have been lucky to play in two linked series of Star Wars Saga games. My experience with the system has been as a player, but my GM and I have discussed the system quite a bit. He'll chime in with comments in italics throughout the article. Katana Geldar wrote a nice post about the recent announcement by Wizards of the ...

While I was watching old movies and cleaning out my basement a few weeks ago, I watched a movie that made me go “Wow! That was totally someone’s role-playing game!”.  It wasn’t the first time that happened to me, and this isn't the first time that the idea has been discussed here on the stew ( 1 | 2 ). There are a lot of movies and ...

Are there GMing questions you'd like to ask, but that you're kind of of embarrassed about asking? Questions that seem too basic, too simple, or too should-be-obvious to ask other GMs in person? Here on the Stew, we love practical GMing questions -- and there's no shame in asking them. Any of them. I've been GMing for over 20 years, and I still fuck up on a semi-regular basis. All of ...

One of the challenges in a new campaign occurs when the players discover that they do not like their characters. Given time, the lack of excitement on the players’ part will degrade any efforts to sustain the campaign and ultimately lead to its collapse. Even the greatest plotline or the most richly described world will not hold your players at the table if they have no passion or ...

Get your bull's-eye lantern, a 10 ft pole, and some spikes, because we are taking a journey into the dungeons of yesteryear. For those of you who did not battle the  Slavers, wander the Borderlands, defeat the Giants, and stood in the Demonweb Pits, you are in luck. Goodman Games provides you an old school Sherpa, in the way of The Dungeon Alphabet. Disclaimer—Goodman games was kind enough to ...

As a GM, you have access to a lot of information the players never see. This can be mutually frustrating, because you have ideas and concepts you never get to illustrate, and the players may have holes in their picture of the game world that they would like to understand. One of the less common techniques for giving the players a broader view of the world you’ve created ...

Andy Collins, Wizards of the Coast's RPG Development & Editing Manager, wrote to us asking if we thought our readers would be interested in this job opening at WotC. We think you'll be interested: A new job posting for an RPG Editor just went up on the Hasbro job site. This person reports directly to me, so I have a vested interest in (and significant influence on) the result of ...

A modern variant of the mythical "grim and gritty" fantasy campaign is the "standard horror" campaign. How many of us have dreamed of running a horror adventure (horror generally doesn't lend itself well to campaigns without high PC turnover rates) where all of the PCs are regular people forced to confront something horrific? How much fun would it be to have a flight attendant, a bookish college student, ...

While talking with a friend about a game system development issue, I had the spark of an idea for an alternate hit point system that could easily be merged into almost any game system. It applies mostly to enemies and is aimed at controlling the pacing and drama of combat. Sitting down to think about this, it feels really sound and interesting. I'm going to use it ...

This is one in a periodic series of articles looking at second cities — places to base a campaign in published settings other than such signature cities as Waterdeep, Greyhawk or Sharn. City: Hardby (5,100) Published setting: Greyhawk (Wizards of the Coast/TSR) Why it’s a good choice: Clearly, the City of Greyhawk is the heart of the Flanaess, which means many of the great adventuring sites are near to the Free ...

We just created another way to connect with Gnome Stew: our Facebook page. There you can become a fan of the Stew, post weird photos of your butt on our wall, and generally help make our wives wonder even more what the hell we do all day when we're "working on Gnome Stew." Like all gnomes, we're obsessed with a) connecting with our fans and readers, and b) CRUSHING THE ...

I recently volunteered to run a couple of sessions for the new con in town this upcoming weekend on Saturday and Sunday. I already know the organizers from their previous efforts, where they coordinated game days at local library. In many ways this is just a bigger version of their library game days- though much more ambitious, including an attendance fee, five time slots with six games apiece ...