Award-Winning GMing Advice
Gnome Stew won the silver ENnie Award for Best Blog in
2011 and
2010 -- thank you for your support! Online since 2008, we've published
1,110 articles packed with GMing tips and advice, as well as
two books for GMs. Our
top 30 articles make a great starting point for new readers.
"I check Gnome Stew every day." -- Monte Cook
"fantastic blog for game masters, dungeon masters, and rpg fans" -- Wil Wheaton
"If you aren’t reading Gnome Stew, you’re missing out." -- Wolfgang Baur
IcebergTitanic had a question that will hopefully end more successfully than his handle's history.
Similar to the questions on Metagaming, I would like to see an article on how a GM can give hints and clues for a story without the players immediately leaping upon it. You know, the old “if the GM mentioned it, it must be important!”
Example: The PC’s are meeting an important dignitary for dinner, ...
Dipping a ladle into our suggestion pot, I see that NinjaBait had a question about setting details: I’ve been a DM/GM for several years now. I’ve never had any complaints about my stories or settings, but I’ve never felt very comfortable with describing what I’m seeing in my head. “The pungent stench of mildew emanates from the wet dungeons walls as stagnant water sloshes around your feet” becomes ...
Over at the Suggestion Pot, Gnome Stew reader and high-level Cleric BishopOfBattle cast Divination (or maybe it was Find the Path; I’ve taken too many negative levels in d20 to be an expert). Anyway, he asked: How do the Gnomes go about getting better player feedback? Often articles mention "Ask your players" but I often have difficulty getting useful (or sometimes any) feedback from ...
Caring about characters is a tricky thing. Many GMs struggle just to get players to like their own character--to treat their character as a person, with coherent thoughts and feelings, instead of viewing their character as an attractive array of powers and stats.
Once you do reach that lofty pinnacle of caring about your character, there's a further step awaiting. Now that your character is becoming vivid and real ...
Pixedragon asked about several things that often tangle together into a big knot: mysteries, clues, and the GM's spotlight versus the player's flashlights. It also ties into the thrashing that often develops in a Sandbox setting. Here's what was asked: Hiya, I have a question concerning GMing, and it’s something I’ve noticed with other GM’s and in my own game.
We tend to play rather RP-heavy games so it’s ...
Back in January, I wrote about using PC backgrounds as a campaign roadmap, and I've been putting a version of that concept into practice in my current Star Trek game. It's been fun and it's saved me time, so I thought it might be useful to you.
Specifically, I used a version of the Three Things approach created by the Stew's own Don Mappin: I asked my players for ...
Over in Le Pote du Suggestiones, Gnome Stew reader gustavovp asked us a great question. As I was typing up a response that began "I don't think there's an article in this, because..." I realized that there was -- and that many of our readers may not know about the Suggestion Pot at all.
The Suggestion What, Now?
Given that close to 4,000 of you read the Stew via RSS ...
As soon as I saw this comment from Chando42 in our Suggestion Pot, I started writing -- this one's a doozy!
In fact, there's so much too it that there's no single theme that can tie together this article. Instead, I'm just going to tackle it piece by piece and try to offer useful advice for each element. It's pretty freeform. My hips, I have shot from them!
The truth ...
Phil already answered Tabulazero's question about note taking, in his post A Deeper Understanding of GM Notes, but I recently found some notes and thought that a couple of concrete examples might prove useful. I'm really answering the second half of the question more, since I'll be sharing notes from a 4e game and my recent Spirit of the Century game.
To refresh, here was the question: I would ...
As I continue to use and love Obsidian Portal for game prep (Going Digital: Using Obsidian Portal to Prep for, Run, and Document a Campaign), it occurs to me that a basic wiki principle can be applied to non-wiki-based prep, too: Add it now, build it later.
The prep I've been focused on recently has been creating NPCs. I asked each of my players to include three NPCs they'd ...
You are done. You have run your campaign, and through scheduling follies, player-player conflicts, and the occasional near-TPK, you have guided your players through the climax of your storyline, and are now ready to pack it up and move on to a new campaign. Before you lay this campaign to rest, take an evening to sit with your players and review the ...
In le Pot de Suggestiones, Gnome Stew reader scoopsy asked this excellent question:
I’m fairly good at coming up with adventures and adventure hooks (and Eureka! is there for those times when I’m not), but I frequently find it difficult to tie them into a larger, compelling campaign. If we spend more than 2-3 sessions on a villain or plotline, it seems I start losing people and then it’s ...
Over in the Suggestion Pot, Gnome Stew reader renner asked us to write an article on this topic:
How do you handle a narrative combat? Mainly, if you are used to miniatures and maps, and don’t want to use them anymore.
Prior to D&D 3.0, the majority of RPGs used narrative combat -- IE, combat that's largely descriptive, with a sketchy map if a map is used at all. From ...
In the suggestion pot, Zig had a fun idea. He requested that we hit our magic workshops, slave over toys, and report on what the little girls and boys thought. Wait, that's not it. Here's what he really asked. Hi, Guys.
Something I would find very interesting and useful would be a collaboration article from all of you about one unique magic item you have each had in ...
Over in the Suggestion Pot, Stew reader AquaFox said:
I haven’t seen many articles that give good insight on the GM screen. Its usefulness, what it’s there for, what its alternatives are. I would love to see an article like that on Gnome Stew, since I have not seen anything similar anywhere else.
I'm our resident screen fetishist, with around 10 screens in my library -- I love GMing screens ...
